


just hold on, we're going home

by gravitycentered



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Cisswap, F/F, F/M, Genderswap, Infidelity, girl!Louis, girl!Zayn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-16
Updated: 2014-01-16
Packaged: 2018-01-08 20:13:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 20,826
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1136885
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gravitycentered/pseuds/gravitycentered
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Their foreheads lightly knock together and Zayn leans into her; when Louis opens her eyes, she’s met with Zayn’s looking back, too close for her to see between them clearly. </i>
</p><p> </p><p>louis has a boyfriend, but she also has zayn.</p>
            </blockquote>





	just hold on, we're going home

**Author's Note:**

> I FINISHED A FIC FOR BIG BANG!!! super special thanks are in order: [any](http://archiveofourown.org/users/cmdf/) and [em](http://archiveofourown.org/users/randominity) for tons of support and read-throughs, [bridget](http://archiveofourown.org/users/khakis) for catching all the little details i missed, [kat](http://archiveofourown.org/users/katharinewrites) for MASSIVE amounts of help and reassurance in the early planning of this fic and [sana](http://archiveofourown.org/users/amongseafarers) for being my biggest fan ♥ ♥ ♥ 
> 
> my artist for this fic made a PERFECT mix the includes some of my favorite songs (and my favorite artists!!!! the like!!!!!!!) [HERE](http://speeding-cars.livejournal.com/154696.html), please go leave her some feedback and listen along while you read :D
> 
> i should note that there are a few uses of gendered slurs in this fic, none used maliciously toward another character.

“Bored?” Harvey whispers. 

Louis hums and tilts her head to whisper back, considering the scene on the giant screen before them: a girl is crying and looking off into the distance, and has been for several moments. “I am a bit lost, to be honest.” 

He squeezes her thigh and laughs under his breath, “We could leave?” 

“And let all your hard-earned cash go to waste after buying the tickets?” 

“I’d rather get some use out of the hotel room I bought for tonight with my hard-earned cash,” Harvey replies. Louis’ stomach gives an uncomfortable kick, and she turns to look at Harvey. His eyes are back on the film, but the corners of his mouth are downturned purposefully, struggling to hold back a grin. 

“You’re serious? What’s your mum gonna think of you paying for a room somewhere when you’ve got one right at home?” 

Harvey clears his throat, glancing toward the exit. “She thinks m’not coming round til tomorrow. I wanted a night alone with you first.” 

“Oh,” Louis says, eloquently. Harvey squeezes her leg again, and she pats the back of his hand, running her fingertips over his knuckles. “That’s the surprise, then.” 

“That’s the surprise,” he agrees. When he looks at her face, finally, he’s chewing on the inside of his lip, mouth turned down properly now. 

“I’ve got work so early, darling,” Louis murmurs, pulling his hand from her thigh to hold it between her own. Harvey clings onto her fingers and folds himself down in his seat to press his forehead to her shoulder, sighing. 

“I should’ve told you,” he says, dejectedly. Louis kisses the top of his head and sighs herself, closing her eyes. 

“It’s a sweet surprise, love. Can you drop me at the hospital in the morning?” 

“Yes,” Harvey answers. He’s still mumbling disappointedly but his voice tips up toward hopefulness, so this time Louis flicks him on the ear. 

“Alright, enough crying, I’ve enough babies to listen to in a few hours.” 

“I love you,” Harvey says, popping up to kiss the corner of her mouth. “I’ll try not to keep you up too late, yeah?” 

“We better get moving then. I need my beauty sleep,” Louis teases. Harvey kisses her square on the lips this time, briefly, and smiles as they stand up and work their way out of their row, fingers linked. 

When they get to the theater lobby, Louis breaks contact to head to the ladies room. “Need a wee,” she explains. 

“Charming,” Harvey replies; Louis can hear him laugh behind her as she flashes him her middle finger without looking back. 

In one of the stalls, Louis digs her phone out of her purse and types out a message to Zayn. 

_He’s bought a hotel room for the night_

Zayn replies back almost immediately, while Louis’ still struggling to get her knickers down from underneath the tight skirt of her dress. _On a scale of 1 to 10 ?_

 _Not there yet. I’m expecting about a 6._ By the time Louis’ washing her hands, Zayn still hasn’t sent a text back, so she leaves one more message, _Your dress must’ve done the trick_.

 

Inside their room, Louis kicks off her shoes, tosses her purse and jacket on the table, and texts Zayn: _It’s a 4._ The only open room Harvey could get was a smoking room, and despite the thorough cleaning by hotel staff, the scent lingers in the air like a stain, almost. The bed is big, at least, with a rough duvet and a thick set of sheets underneath. 

_Ouch. Use a condom ;) x_ , Zayn sends back. Louis tucks her phone back into her purse before wandering around the room, inspecting the amenities. She fiddles with the basket full of complimentary soaps and shampoos and is just beginning to stack them in a line along the counter when Harvey walks up behind her, visible in the mirror that occupies half the wall. 

“Your dress looks uncomfortable,” he says. He’s a head taller than her and Louis can see his expressions in the mirror, watching him look her over with no hint of a joke in his face. She rolls her eyes. 

“That was a truly terrible line,” she replies. Harvey smiles faintly, but just smooths a hand down her arm. “It’s Zayn’s dress, though, so… it is a bit uncomfortable, to be honest,” she admits. 

“We should get you out of it, then,” Harvey suggests, his fingers already sliding down her back in search of a zipper. “Even though I’m sure you wear it better than Zayn does.”

“That I do. She hasn’t got the bum to fill it out, has she?” 

Harvey drags the zip of the dress down as far as it’ll go, wedging his fingers in the gaps it creates to tug the fabric away from Louis’ shoulders. “And she never will, because it’s mine.” 

“Oh, god,” Louis whispers, dropping her head and giggling to herself under her breath. She’s grateful for the comedic distraction, unintentional as it is. 

It’s been nearly a month since she’s last seen Harvey in person, and she’s nervous about it for reasons she can’t pinpoint. His first year of university went well; they made the two-hour journey between his campus and her house in shifts, multiple times a week, often spending full weekends together, hardly different than when Harvey was finishing up sixth form. Now, though, his second year, his schedule is much more taxing. The weekends are full of obligations, club meetings and play rehearsals and exams to study for. Louis has her own schedule to manage as well, putting in extra shifts at the hospital. 

Until Harvey had brought up his booked hotel room, Louis hadn’t even considered that they’d be in a position to have sex again. They’d given up on phone sex early on for several reasons - after Harvey’s roommate walked in on him wanking on the phone with Louis, which put him off the idea, most notably - save for a few naughty picture messages sent, months ago. Most of their conversations now are about school or work, Louis complaining about 12 hour shifts and Harvey complaining about his most recent roommate. Zayn’s joked more than once about their transition from newlyweds to an old married couple, bed death and all; Louis didn’t grasp how true the jokes rang until this moment, when the boyfriend she hasn’t seen in weeks is trying to undress her and she’s thinking of how much sleep she can get before she’ll have to wake up for her 8am shift. 

“Let’s lie down,” Louis suggests. She works the hem of Zayn’s dress up over her hips so she can pull it off over her head, letting Harvey watch; he makes quick work of his own clothes afterward, stripping down to his pants while Louis climbs up on the bed and underneath the sheets, still in her bra and knickers. 

Harvey crawls right on top of her after subtly snagging a condom out of his wallet. The only light he left on is a lamp in the corner of the room, dull and yellow, and Louis pets his hair, sighing at the weight of him. She spreads her legs so he can fit between them and wraps her arms around his neck, linking her fingers together to hold on. As he kisses her, Louis finds herself equal parts pleased to have him back like this, skin against skin, and wishing that they could just fall asleep this way. 

By the time Harvey is pushing his cock into her, Louis would more enthusiastically choose sleep over sex. Harvey’s being careful; he knows how long it’s been. It’s familiar and almost comforting having him inside her, but the downside of that comfort that makes Louis feel a sharp little bite of guilt is that she’s _bored_. While her body remembers how to react, she still finds herself glad for the extra glide of lube from the condom, knowing she’s not wet enough to take him without it. Harvey works himself close to orgasm quickly, and Louis tries to help him along, squeezing tight around his cock and murmuring encouragements against his ear. He moans sweetly when he comes, like he always does, and Louis doesn’t bother pretending to get there with him, content to kiss his jaw instead while he calms down. 

She’s already exhausted and he seems to be the same after he gets rid of the condom, overly affectionate, wrapping both of his arms around Louis’ waist. “That okay?” he mumbles quietly. Louis just nods, much happier to be tucked up against him like this, warm and snug. 

“Missed you,” Harvey says. Louis tilts her chin up, eyes closed, seeking his mouth for a kiss; he gives it willingly, rubbing both hands up and down her back as Louis drifts to sleep.

 

\--

 

After divorcing her husband, nearly ten years past now, Harvey’s mother, Janet, redecorated their entire home. Harvey’s told her the story enough times: she sold their sofa, dining table, patio furniture, the marriage bed she and Harvey’s father saved for years to afford, all at once. With the money from her sale, she bought scaled-down versions of the same pieces, smaller furniture to visibly erase the ghost of her husband’s presence from her home, to sever the connection between them all at once instead of allowing it to wither away on its own. 

Spending time with Janet is an affair more intimate than Louis expects, even after three years. Louis has to fit in the space they’ve made for two people on their own, squeezing her way both physically and emotionally into a position between them. Dinner means she sits at the two-person table in a third chair, re-introduced specifically for her, knees touching both Harvey’s and his mother’s beneath the tablecloth. 

Harvey manages to keep whatever’s exciting him to himself until after Janet’s finished scooping three bowlfuls of ice cream for their dessert. He digs his spoon into the frozen center of his ice cream and lets it stand there, handle vertically stretching out of the bowl, and clears his throat. “So.” 

“Here we are, then,” Janet says, cradling her bowl against the gentle bulge of her belly, full from dinner. “Moment of truth.” 

“Mum,” Harvey says, long-suffering like a teenager, just as Louis says, “What?” 

Her senses sharpen to the situation alarmingly quickly. They don’t usually do dinner with Harvey’s mum; they’ll come to her house and pile onto the love-seat for a film, or head straight to Harvey’s room for a cuddle in his own bed. A night truly to themselves is a rare treat, one that’s only happened once before, barring last night, on their very first anniversary. Harvey’s been watching her all night. His eyes are the biggest clue of his excitement; they become wide, a grey so full of clarity that he almost looks cold despite his happy, open smile. 

“ _So_ ,” Harvey repeats, “I’ve been thinking. We’ve already talked about it before, loads of times.” 

“Right,” Louis says. There’s a rushing noise beginning to build in her ears, becoming loud quite rapidly, and she pushes it away to focus on Harvey’s mouth as he speaks. 

“You know I can’t stand my bloody roommate, and after this term we’d have plenty of time to get everything settled over the summer… So I was thinking, like… Maybe after this term we could look for a little flat somewhere so I wouldn’t live on campus anymore?”

The reason for the implosion Louis feels in her gut is uncertain: nervousness, relief, disappointment, or all of the above. She tries not to let her voice waver. “Like we, together?” 

“We _have_ talked about it,” Harvey says, and that’s true. Louis takes a long pull from her wine glass and prepares a spoonful of ice cream that she’s not sure she’ll get all the way up to her mouth. 

“It’s been a while since we have, though,” she says. The end of her spoon shivers along with her trembling hands, so she drops it back into the bowl and flinches when metal clinks loudly against ceramic. “You hadn’t even started uni yet, I didn’t even have a job. What about my job?” 

“I’ve thought about that,” Harvey counters, raising his voice to drown out her complaints before they can come to full fruition. “There’s the hospital just ten, twelve minutes away from uni, couldn’t you like, transfer there? Or apply to get in for a job there?” 

“Um,” Louis says. 

“Or you could do the commute?” he suggests.

Louis laughs, unfairly bitter. “That’s not going to happen.” She tucks her hands between her thighs to keep from fidgeting with them, keeping her eyes on Harvey’s. “Why am I the one that’s meant to commute or transfer? You could go to a different uni.” 

Harvey’s face immediately changes, his eyebrows dropping from inquisitive to upset. “I’m settled here, Lou.” 

“No, actually, you’ve settled _there_ , but _I’m_ still settled here. I’ve got a job and a place to live where I’m not paying rent.” 

“You know I’ve travelled for _you_ the last two years without complaining, don’t you?” Harvey asks. The squeak of Janet’s chair against the linoleum floor is the only thing that helps Louis hold her tongue, watching Harvey look off to the side to avoid either of their eyes.

Janet quietly stands up, busying herself by gathering her untouched dessert bowl and their empty glasses. Harvey stays quiet until she’s out of earshot, the swinging kitchen door finally still behind her entrance. “If you want to live with your mum forever…” 

“You live with your mum!” Louis says, incredulous. “A cardboard box of a dorm room doesn’t change that! When you tell people you’re going home you mean _here_ , and that’s not a fucking bad thing, so don’t make it sound like I’m the immature one right now.” 

“You could just fucking say no,” Harvey spits. 

“No, then,” Louis says, ironically childish, crossing her arms under her chest. Harvey gives her a sardonic nod and tosses his hands up, getting out of his chair to stalk off in the opposite direction of his mother. 

“Thanks very much for the consideration,” he throws over his shoulder as he pounds his way up the stairs to the second floor. Louis lets out an explosive sigh and channels all the energy vibrating through her limbs into leveling out her breathing.

She gets maybe thirty solid seconds to herself before Janet sneaks back in and places a hand on her shoulder, squeezing affectionately. Louis stares ahead for a long block of time before she acknowledges the touch, long enough that she’s sure it’s gotten awkward. 

“I feel like the both of you always get the privilege of seeing me at my absolute worst,” Louis says. She’s quiet, not sure if any she’ll be able to hold back the tears if she puts any power behind her words as long as there’s a motherly hand anchoring her to her feelings. 

“I told him he’s got the worst timing in the goddamn world,” Janet says, and it makes Louis huff out a laugh. “He asked me about it this morning, and I told him he ought to wait because the only person this would benefit is him, but he got himself too excited about the idea.” 

“If he’d have asked me two years ago, I wouldn’t even have thought about saying no,” Louis admits. She chances a look up at Janet’s face and regrets it when she sees the small, sad smile waiting for her. “I ought to go find him.” 

“You know where he’ll be sulking.” 

Louis laughs again without any amusement and slowly makes her way up the stairs, toward Harvey’s room. He’s left the door open, like he’s expecting her. 

“Hiya,” Louis says from the doorway; Harvey looks at her from where he’s stood, idling in front of his study desk, eyes wet. Louis sighs and goes to him, wrapping an insistent hand around the back of his neck and pulling gently until Harvey lets go, caving in on himself to rest his head on her shoulder.

“You have to let me think about it, darling,” Louis murmurs. She kisses the side of Harvey’s neck and hugs him close, stepping up onto her toes so he doesn’t have to lean down quite as far. Harvey sniffles against her top, nodding, and Louis smiles, hopelessly endeared. “You big baby.” 

“Shut up,” he says. He rubs down her back, fingertips combing through the strands of her hair. “I dunno why, I’ve been thinking about it so much more lately. I only thought about the good stuff though, like, how it’d be to be together so much.” Harvey sighs and straightens himself up enough to look at her. 

It could be great. Louis likes her busy house full of sisters, but a tiny, lived-in flat with Harvey could be just as nice: waking up warm from the heat of another body, decorating a space just for the two of them, building the kind of solidity that Louis always thought she’d have by now.

“You can still stay tonight if you want,” Harvey says. Louis holds his face in both her hands and squeezes gently, until he puffs his lips out in a pout. 

“I won’t stay when you’re cross with me. You’re coming home again next weekend, yeah?” 

“Yeah,” Harvey mumbles, mouth still squished. 

“I’ll stay then.” She kisses his lips, chastely, before letting go to hug him again, tucking her head underneath his chin. A part of her wants desperately to stay the night anyway, to pillow her head on Harvey’s chest and pretend she hadn’t lost her temper, to tell him _yes_ instead of _maybe one day_. The bigger part of her feels the unavoidable tug in her stomach, pulling her in the opposite direction like a magnet. 

“Love you,” she says, squeezing him tight when Harvey kisses her hair. 

 

\--

 

Instead of heading straight home, Louis goes to Zayn’s house. It’s still early, barely dark out yet, and Safaa is the first one she sees when she comes through the front door. 

“Is she in her room?” Louis asks as she toes off her shoes. 

Safaa shakes her head, “Basement.” The two braids on either side of her head waggle around with the movement, and Louis gently tugs one as she passes by. 

Entering the door separating the first level of the house from the basement means getting hit with a wall of chilled, stale air and the smell of paint. Zayn has music playing from somewhere, probably her laptop judging from the tinny, flat quality of the sound, quiet enough to be undetectable from upstairs. Courteously, Louis stomps her way down the last five creaky steps to announce her presence and avoid scaring Zayn out of her skin. 

“Hiya,” Zayn says, not looking. Her designated art wall has a new addition, a human-sized robot that matches Zayn’s height, its gear-shaped eyes gathering more depth with each swipe of her pencil. 

Louis plants face-first into the back of Zayn’s neck and grips her around the waist, slightly pathetically. “That looks sick,” she says. 

“I thought you were Waliyha!” Louis can feel Zayn try to turn her head back to look at her, but Louis’ trapped her hair between their bodies so she faces forward again, going back to drawing instead. “Weren’t you gonna stay at Harvey’s mum’s?” 

“We had a row,” Louis mumbles unhappily. The further away from Harvey she is, the more the guilt pricks at her conscience. “And I feel like a bit of a twat, if ‘m honest.” 

“Babe,” Zayn says, sympathetic; she tosses her pencil into the disorganized mess of an art case on the floor and pats Louis’ arms, signaling for her to loosen her hold. Louis does, gladly, burrowing into a proper hug once Zayn turns to face her. 

“Like,” Louis starts, resting her head on Zayn’s shoulder, face turned toward in toward her. Zayn’s stroking along the curve of her spine, slow and soothing like she’s always done when Louis gets upset. “Like, I knew _something_ was up, but only after it already happened. Like yesterday?” 

“The room,” Zayn supplies. 

“And at dinner he was so excited for something, you know, like, a bit fidgety. I just knew, all of it put together, right?” 

Zayn tries to look at her again and Louis realizes she hasn’t shown her face since she arrived, so she straightens up to her full height but doesn’t pull back from Zayn’s hold yet. 

“He didn’t—” Zayn cuts herself off, looking unsure. When she speaks again, her mouth is tilted up at the side in a nondescript half smile like she’s ready for a variety of replies. “He didn’t, like, propose, did he?” 

“Oh, god,” Louis says. She lets her head loll forward onto Zayn’s shoulder. “No, but I fucking thought he was about to! He asked me to move in with him.” 

“And you said no.”

“More or less,” Louis sighs. “I just, like… I feel bad that I don’t even want to? I hardly considered it, but we haven’t even _talked_ about it since he went to uni. I literally don’t know where this is coming from.” 

“I guess he misses you,” Zayn says, halfheartedly playing the devil’s advocate. She alternates hands, using her left to rub Louis’ back now. 

“He said I should transfer to a hospital closer to his campus to work, or, like, just apply for a different job.” 

“Uh, what?” Zayn stills suddenly and Louis finally steps back, shrugging. 

“I just don’t think it’s fair,” Louis says. 

“That’s because it’s not.” Zayn crouches down to shove all of her tubs of paint and worn down pencils, colored and charcoal, into her case, closing it with a careless slam. “Like, that’s a lot of work on _your_ part, the only thing he’s got to do is pack a few boxes.” 

“You sound like me at dinner,” Louis admits.

“Yeah, and what’s that about? Making you have to answer in front of his mum, like. Did he just assume you were gonna say yes and up and leave?” 

“She was alright about it, though,” Louis says, feeling strangely defensive of Janet. “Like, she basically said she didn’t think it was a good idea either but he didn’t listen to her.” 

“Still embarrassing,” Zayn says, crossing the floor to grab her laptop and power cord from the meager wooden table, the only piece of furniture on her side of the basement. When she snaps the screen down the music stops abruptly, leaving a distant ringing in Louis’ ears to fill the silence. 

“Can I stay the night?” 

“Course, you can sleep til I get home from class in the morning?” 

“Nah, I’ve got work anyway. I just need a cuddle,” Louis sighs, pulling the saddest face she can muster at Zayn, lower lip stuck out dramatically. 

“Aw,” Zayn coos, partly amused. She crowds up against Louis and kisses her cheek several times in a row and then, much more tenderly, the arch of her brow. Louis closes her eyes and feels for Zayn’s free hand, twisting their fingers together and squeezing tight. 

“You’re not a twat, darling,” Zayn says softly, genuine now. “I’m sorry he put you in this position.” 

Their foreheads lightly knock together and Zayn leans into her; when Louis opens her eyes, she’s met with Zayn’s looking back, too close for her to see between them clearly. 

 

\--

 

Mornings at the hospital are by far the most pleasant, despite the dread Louis first dealt with upon realizing she’d have to wake at 5:30, sometimes before the sunrise, to make it to work on time. Each shift that starts at 8am gives her Bonnie, her favorite desk-mate, as they’ve all begun calling themselves, and both visitors and soon-to-be-mums alike are energized by the daylight. Husbands, parents or friends sign in excitedly with Louis as the new mum holds her belly in the background and lowers herself into a wheelchair or paces the floor, smiling at the strangers who are looking on in excitement. Mornings are nice. There’s very rarely any screaming in the mornings. 

Today there’s only one group in the waiting area with them, but a large group it is: two sets of tittering grandparents, a toddler, and a pair of teenage boys, yawning into the shoulders of their hoodies and lazily scrolling through their phones. After twenty minutes of no more admissions and watching the child try to squirm out of the lap of one old woman, Louis comes out from behind the desk to ask if they’d like anything, any water or tea or coffee. They all decline politely, so Louis directs her attention to the toddler, asking if he’d like a book to read, perhaps some blocks to build with. He hides his face against the woman’s chest. 

“Ah, forgive him, he’s a shy one,” the old woman drawls. 

“That’s alright,” Louis says. She crosses the room and crouches down to open the bottom door on a shelf, exposing a rack of toys and brightly colored books with thick cardboard pages, everything still stacked neatly from the cleaning the night shift gave the waiting room during whatever lull they could find. 

“I’ll leave that open, just in case anyone who happens to be in the room is in need of a little entertainment,” Louis says, winking swiftly at the woman holding the baby. Gesturing toward the teenagers, she teases, “Maybe you lads could take a crack at one of those books, yeah? About your level?” 

“Too advanced for him,” one replies. The other boy pulls a surly face and punches the first in the shoulder, glaring down at his phone. Louis raises both eyebrows at Bonnie when her back is turned to the group. 

“Not a morning man, that one,” she mumbles as she settles back in her seat. Bonnie smiles demurely in the way that she does when she’s keeping a laugh held inside. 

Time slips on; a full hour passes and all that happens is the toddler finally escaping the woman’s clutches to paw through a book, the cranky teen falling asleep, and a single, frustrated yell from a mother in labor from behind them in the actual maternity wing. Louis begins to get bored, bouncing in her chair to alleviate the pinpricks that start when her bum falls asleep. After another half hour brings them one visitor who smiles warmly but merely continues on to his destination, Louis checks the computers for what happened since her last shift for something to do. She tries to save discreetly checking Twitter or Facebook until after lunch, at least. 

“Only two women admitted last night?” Bonnie asks, reading over her shoulder. 

“Must not be baby season,” Louis says. She scans both names but pauses at the second, reading it and then re-reading it again, to be sure. “Wait.” 

“What?” 

Thompson, Kimberly, checked in at 4:24am. “I know her!” Louis exclaims. “Well, I might know her, if that’s the right one. I went to college with a Kim Thompson.” 

“Oh! D’you want to go check? It’s been a good few hours, she might’ve had it by now, to be honest.” Bonnie clicks around on her own computer to pull up the file, snooping around the info they’re cleared to see. 

“You alright here?” 

“It’s fine,” Bonnie answers, waving her hand toward the group still waiting. Both grandfathers, the angry teen and the toddler are drifting in and out of sleep now. 

Louis nudges Bonnie’s shoulder in thanks as she gets up and heads into the wing, checking room numbers before quietly knocking on the door that’s meant to be Kim’s, prepared to apologize for intruding if she’s got the wrong person. A nurse Louis recognizes by face only opens the door, and Louis smiles as she peeks around her to see into the room. 

Kim sees her first. “Louis?” she asks, bewildered, congested from crying. Louis gently squeezes into the room and goes to where Kim’s standing by her bed, the sheets rumpled and pillow indented from her head. “What the bloody fuck are you doing here?” 

Louis cackles out of surprise at the language. “I work here, darling,” she says. “Motherhood’s put a mouth on you, there, hasn’t it?” 

“Oh, god, this one’s tryin’ to kill me,” Kim says, sniffling unabashedly. “Can you take over from here, can I switch out nurses?” 

“I’m not a nurse, I’m not even allowed to take your temperature,” Louis says; before the last syllables come out, Kim’s face goes red as she holds her breath, fighting against a contraction. “You do need to breathe, though, love, come on now,” she coaxes. Kim’s breath leaves her in a great sob, and she clutches onto the hand Louis offers. The nurse comes over to place a wet flannel against the back of Kim’s neck where she’s bent to brace herself, murmuring quietly and encouragingly. 

“Oh my god,” Kim cries, stumbling as she comes out of the contraction to sit on the edge of her bed. 

“One step closer,” Louis tries, helping her sit down. Working with mums in pain is much more difficult than working with their babies. 

“Where the _fuck_ is Curtis?” Kim asks. She wails it, really, loud into Louis’ left ear, her fingernails still digging sharply into Louis’ wrist. 

“Curtis is the daddy?” Louis asks back, strangely pleased to hear it; they’d all been close at college, Curtis and Kim together nearly as long as her and Harvey. “I could phone him for you if you’ve got a number?” 

“I’ll fuckin’ kill him,” Kim says, releasing Louis to grip her own knees as she leans forward. “He’s just meant to be pickin’ up my mum, if he’s not back in a mo’ this baby might be here before he is.” 

“I’m at the front desk, love, I’ll send them back the second they show up,” Louis promises. “And I’ll come check on you during my lunch break, yeah?” 

“Please,” Kim pleads, nodding. Louis kisses her damp hair and makes her way out. 

Curtis shows up 15 minutes later, speed-walking into the waiting area with an ecstatic woman behind him. He hugs Louis with the front desk between them and knocks over the cup of pens in his haste to get back to Kim, apologizing profusely as Kim’s mother pushes him along. By the time Louis shovels down her lunch and makes it back to Kim’s room, there’s a tiny little baby swaddled in Kim’s arms. 

With Curtis and Kim’s mother occupying the only chairs, Louis perches carefully on the edge of Kim’s bed, smiling back at the beaming parents, her two old friends. “How’re you feeling, love?” 

“Like I’m never gonna stop blubbering,” Kim admits. Her eyes are red and swollen, the skin of her face still patchy from exertion, and Louis wants to kiss her forehead and tell her she’s done well. “I’ve cried more than him,” she says, gazing down at her child. 

“Reckon he’s not gonna be a crier,” Curtis says, squeezing gently at the bottom of the blanket, where his son’s feet must be. 

“I’ll hope not, for your sakes. What’s his name?” Louis asks. 

“William, for his granddad. He’s just passed this last year,” Kim says. She sniffles and wipes her cheeks with the back of her wrist before propping little William up a bit more, tilting him so Louis can see his sleeping face. 

“William is a good name.” He’s an average size for a newborn from what she can see, his small round face and squished features; she knows he’s technically ugly to any objective eye, but she still wants to brush her fingertips over his thin skin and press her cheek against his fluffy, frizzy hair. “I can’t believe _you_ lot have gone and made a baby.” 

“I can’t believe you _haven’t_ ,” Kim laughs in response, and Louis smiles politely, belly gone cold at the idea. “You still goin’ with Harvey?” 

“I figured you’d be up to 2 or 3 by now,” Curtis jokes, and Louis has to laugh this time out of sheer absurdity. 

“Oh, god,” she shakes her head, “he’s hardly 20.” 

She isn’t, though. She’s going on 23, and in every fantasy she’s had about her life up until this point, there’s definitely been a child in the picture; a husband and a child and then another and another. As a girl, she’d think of sets of names for her future children: 3 girls and 3 boys, or 1 boy and 4 girls, or all girls, really, because girl names sound better. Her mum had her at 19, very much accidentally, but Louis secretly hoped for the same kind of happy accident; when she’d met Harvey, she’d let herself think of what their children might be like and sometimes dared to ask Harvey the same, about whose eyes they’d get, whose height. The reality of how unprepared they both are for children now, years later, leaves Louis sad in the face of her friends who have formed their own family. 

After leaving them to get used to their new dynamic, Louis spends the rest of her shift making mental notes of patient names, combining them into twos and threes. She goes home to her sisters, the only family she’s a part of, and makes sure to squeeze each of them in a hug before leaving for her room. Too tired for any more intensive correspondence, she sends a single _x_ in a text message to Harvey, Zayn and her mum who’s on the late shift and crawls into bed alone, falling asleep to the sounds of Fizzy’s radio across the hall and Lottie rounding up the twins. 

 

\--

 

“You oughta get another one.” Zayn crowds into Louis’ space and thumbs through the pages of a book of designs, skipping several pages of plain black lines for something more intricate. 

“Absolutely not,” Louis replies. She bats Zayn’s hands away to flip back to an earlier page, idly examining the pictures. “Firstly, I’m too poor, and secondly, mum would have my head.” 

“That’s what mum’s gonna tell _me_ when I walk in the door with _this_ , but I can’t be bothered, to be honest.”

“You’ve got an excuse, though, you’re one of them free spirit uni cunts that’ll do as you like, there’s no restraining you lot. I’m in the _nursing profession_ , I haven’t got a lot of room for tattooing flying kisses all over me forehead, have I?” 

Zayn giggles and knocks her elbow against Louis’, nodding her head at a picture of a man’s bulging biceps adorned with a massive tattoo of Frankenstein’s monster, freshly pink and swollen. “You could be the baddest midwife around. Delivering babies straight into your tatted up palms.” 

Louis hums, but closes the design book with a flourish. “I don’t even like tattoos,” she lies. It makes Zayn grin, another little laugh pushing its way out of her mouth before her face relaxes. There’s only one tattoo on Louis’ body, a tiny lightning bolt made up of thick, careful lines against the skin of her inner ankle, mirrored on the exact same spot on Zayn’s body. The artist had a heavy hand and they both bled for hours afterward, holding red-spotted tissues against their ankles and peeking at each other’s final product, trying to determine if they were as identical as they asked for. Despite her years of initial resistance, Louis found herself staring at the inked spot as it healed and wondering what else she would want on her body, what else she could possibly think up that would be good enough for her to want it permanently. 

“I will be honest though, I’ve always sort of secretly wanted a big chest tattoo,” Louis says, pressing her hands below her own collarbones. “Well, maybe not _massive_. But in this spot.” 

“Copycat,” Zayn jokes. She angles herself to face Louis more fully, trailing her eyes over Louis’ neck and chest as she considers. Louis feels the stare almost like a touch, a subtle flush against her skin when she moves her hands to make it easier to imagine. “I reckon it’d be sexy,” Zayn finally concludes, dragging her gaze back up to Louis’ face. 

“D’you think? Could I maybe borrow a couple hundred pounds and find a good artist to give it a go, then?” 

“Nah, babe. Us free spirit, arty uni cunts haven’t got much cash to spare.” 

“Course not,” Louis scoffs, “not when you’re off wasting it all on _tattoos_.” 

Zayn’s artist finishes up her sketch within the hour, and Louis watches as he painstakingly places the stencil against her skin, smoothing it out with firm sweeps of his hands. “We can go smaller,” he says, but Zayn’s eyes are bright and excited when she checks the placement in the mirror. 

“I think I like it like this,” she says. The piece covers nearly all the bare skin left on her chest; the focal point is the set of lips nestled between her breasts, just above the dip in her top. From the edges of the mouth, two big wings sprout and stretch to the tips of her shoulders, and Zayn pulls the thin straps of her top completely off her shoulders to see the whole picture at once. “Lou?” 

When she turns, Louis takes in the smudgy lines of the stencil and tries to imagine it colored in completely like the sketch Zayn’s been working on, deep red lips and smoke colored wings blanketing Zayn’s naked skin. “It’s gonna look _good_ ,” she says. 

“Yeah?” Zayn trails her fingertips over the edge of one wing and turns back to the mirror to look, moving in small increments to view as many angles as she can. 

“Yeah, shit. It suits you.” 

“I love it, mate,” Zayn says to the artist. “Can we start?” 

 

By the third hour, Louis’ lost feeling in her bum and her fingers. Zayn’s tattoo is taking shape nicely, almost completely shaded in now, and though the strong grip she’s got on Louis’ hand has lessened with time, she still isn’t letting go. The bony center of her chest and the ridges of her clavicles are the worst parts for her, and she whines in pain each time the needle lingers too long in those spots, fingers going tight around Louis’. 

“This is quite similar to coaching expectant mothers,” Louis says. Placing her other hand on Zayn’s belly, she puts on her most earnest voice, “C’mon, love, you’re almost there! Just a little more effort! Don’t pass out now!” 

Zayn’s stomach twitches under her hand with her laughter, and her artist scolds them good-naturedly, “No giggling.” 

“Let’s listen to the man with the large needle,” Louis agrees. 

“Mm,” Zayn hums, a slow agreement. After spending so long getting tattooed at once she’s gone a bit useless, no longer replying to Louis’ banter, just crushing her fingers when she needs to. 

“You in pain, babe?” Louis asks, genuine now. 

“M’alright,” Zayn replies. Her fingers slide against Louis’ when she squeezes this time, too much sweat built up between them, but she doesn’t pull away so Louis doesn’t either. Her eyes are closed, brow furrowed gently against the pain; Louis looks over the detail that’s coming into the wings of her tattoo and down lower to where Zayn’s nipples are hard. She purposely decided against wearing a bra today, knowing the straps would rub against her raw skin on the way home. Louis wonders if that’s her body’s response to pain or if she likes it, if she’d be wet between her legs too after being so overstimulated for so long. 

“I’ve been trying to think of something fun to do with Harvey when he comes home this weekend,” Louis says, reaching for a topic of conversation. 

Zayn hums again, gasping when the needle hits an unexpectedly tender spot. “See a film?” 

“We just did that,” Louis complains. 

“Romantic dinner,” Zayn suggests. “Take him for a picnic. Buy a tandem bike. Go on a hike.” 

“Alright, Dr. Seuss,” Louis says. Zayn smiles, eyes still closed. 

 

\--

 

She chooses the picnic, sort of. 

Saturday afternoon, Louis heads to Asda with a handful of mismatched coupons from a drawer in the kitchen and ends up with two bottles of grape flavored soda, four pre-packaged sandwiches, a massive bag of crisps and three chocolate bars. She piles it into the boot of her car along with the blanket she brought from her closet and goes to pick Harvey up, leaning over to make sure the passenger seat is settled all the way back to accommodate his long legs before he gets in the car. 

“I’ve prepared us a feast,” she says by way of greeting after Harvey’s shut his door. 

“Have you?” he asks, grinning indulgently. 

“Completely handmade,” Louis confirms, already backing out into the street. “A five-course meal, the starter being tenderly grilled filet mignon. Which I am keeping warm in the boot.” 

“So we’ll be eating some takeaway curry this afternoon, will we?” 

“Asda sandwiches. On sale.” Louis frowns, “Though some takeaway would’ve been a better idea, to be honest. Could you plan the next outing, please?” 

“Next outing we’ll go to… Disneyland,” Harvey says. 

“With the 45p I saved on our Asda feast, absolutely,” Louis agrees. She hums when Harvey’s hand finds her bare thigh, squeezing lightly. “Don’t try anything funny while I’m behind the wheel,” she warns, “I break enough vehicles while using my full concentration.” 

“I wouldn’t dare,” Harvey says, teasing like maybe he _would_ actually dare; he doesn’t, though, just slides his hand down to rest at Louis’ knee and keeps it there, watching the view outside his window as they drive. 

It’s a short trip to where Louis wants to spend the afternoon; she parks the car on a stretch of dirt beside the road and lets Harvey grab the food, still in the plastic shop bags. She leads him up the hill they’ve parked beside, a rather quick climb but steep enough that she’s panting a little by the time they reach a spot of land flat enough to spread out the blanket. Her tiny town is easily visible in the distance, but there are no houses on these hills in sight, just stretches of emerald green grass and the view of her car down beside the narrow road. 

“It’s nice up here,” Harvey admits, gingerly setting down the bag with their lunch before taking a seat on the blanket himself. Louis sits beside him, tugging the skirt of her dress down to cover more of her thighs. 

“Was hoping it’d be a bit warmer, but I’ll take it,” she says. The sleeves of her jumper keep her arms warm, but her legs are already tingling from the bite in the wind, and she wishes she’d remembered to bring a second blanket. “And I’m starving, how about you divvy up them sandwiches, babe?” 

Harvey hands her two from the bag along with one of the bottles of soda, but he raises an eyebrow at the odd number of chocolate bars. “Who gets a second one, then?” 

“Obviously we’re going to rock, paper, scissors for it,” Louis replies, mouth already full with her sandwich. “Or you could just give it to me.” 

“I could do that. But I think I’ll let the gods decide your fate,” he says. 

Louis sighs, plays and loses, even after going 3 out of 5, but Harvey still breaks the third bar in equal halves and gives her one of them. They eat quietly after that, shoulder to shoulder, until Harvey brushes off his hands and stretches out on his back, shielding his eyes from the pale sun. 

“So c’mon, talk to me,” Louis demands, sucking a fingerprint’s worth of melted chocolate off her thumb. “How’s uni?” 

“A bit much right now, really,” Harvey sighs. “I could only really escape for today. We’re starting longer rehearsals tomorrow and for the rest of the week since the show is opening on Friday.” 

Louis smiles and pats Harvey’s hip, strangely jealous. Theater is how they met, both working years ago on a community theater adaptation of Hamlet. Louis barely spoke in the whole play - a bitter step down from her lead role as Sandy in Grease during sixth form - but still had to attend every rehearsal seeing as she was an understudy for Ophelia. Harvey worked lights. She remembers his excited phone call after finding out he was signed on to do backstage work this year at his university and how she wished she could be onstage again, following his cues. Drama was the dream, really, the career she never truly planned to go into but wanted desperately to be able to, and even Harvey’s complaints make her miss acting. 

“No sleepovers tonight, then?” she asks. She already knows the answer. Even though she promised she’d stay with him this weekend, usually they make plans by the middle of the week; this week, though, she tried to give him space to be frustrated with her and to give herself space to think about how to let him down in the easiest way. 

“Sorry,” he says, reaching out to find her back and rub. “Are you gonna try to come down and see it next weekend?” 

“I’ll try,” Louis says, even though she’s sure she won’t. She works Saturday and Sunday mornings, and making the trip there and back Friday night to see a play that Harvey’s not even in doesn’t seem like it’d be worth it. 

“The leads are actually quite good,” Harvey says mildly, eyes still closed. He almost sounds sleepy, and hardly reacts when Louis lies down beside him, half on top of his chest. 

Looking at his relaxed face, Louis says, “D’you know what I just realized?” 

“Hm?” 

“You haven’t even kissed me today.” 

A crease forms between Harvey’s brows as he tries to open his eyes, shielding them once again from the sun. The realization hits Louis suddenly and the longer she thinks on it, the more uncomfortable she grows. It’s been an hour now that they’ve spent together, at least; it took her an hour to realize they didn’t even share a kiss hello when Harvey got in her car, after they spent a full week apart. The very first time they reunited after a week spent apart, Louis practically jumped into his arms in her haste to kiss him. 

“We better fix that, then,” he says. 

Louis rushes in to kiss him first, building off the fervor of her memory. It surprises him, she can tell; he makes a muffled noise against her mouth before he catches up with her, gently pulling strands of her hair away from their faces between kisses. Trying to quell the weight in the pit of her stomach, Louis licks into Harvey’s mouth and thinks of the first time he took her top off in the backseat of his car, the first time he fingered her after-hours in the lighting booth at the community theater, the first time he fucked her with her bedroom door locked in the middle of the afternoon. When she slips her chilly fingers under the hem of Harvey’s shirt, he finally turns his mouth away from hers with a gasp, laughing to himself. 

“Jesus, I’d say that makes up for it,” he pants, pulling her cold hand out from under his shirt. Louis kisses the stubbled line of his jaw and feels up to his chest over his clothes instead, and Harvey shivers. “What’s gotten into you, babe?” 

“Was hoping you might get into me,” Louis mumbles; she can feel Harvey’s hum against her lips, and she bites at the skin of his throat to feel it vibrate under her teeth instead.

“Bit cold to be removing any clothes,” Harvey replies. He squirms a little when she sucks at his neck, always ticklish to the feeling. 

“Don’t have to take anything off,” she says, searching for his hand, intending to guide it to her naked thigh and maybe up between her legs to get herself wet quicker. Harvey just squeezes her fingers when she finds his hand, though, resisting the tug. 

“Not out here, Lou, c’mon,” he murmurs, trying to link their fingers together. 

Louis twists her hand out of Harvey’s grip and trails several quick kisses up to his jaw again, headed for his mouth. “No one’ll be able to see anything, no one’s even here,” she coaxes.

“I haven’t got a condom, babe.” 

“I don’t care,” Louis says, half against his mouth, trying for a kiss afterward, but Harvey doesn’t kiss back. 

“Louis,” he says; he sounds firm but not aroused, and when Louis slips her hand down to the front of his jeans she can feel that he’s not hard. Harvey twitches a bit and pulls her hand back again, ducking away from her kisses to sit up. Louis jerks her hands back to herself, holds them against her belly.

The silence that follows is thick and broken only by the whipping of the wind and the constant wash of white noise from the city still close to them. Louis tucks her legs under herself to cover them more fully with her skirt, and then hides her hands inside the long sleeves of her jumper. They’re still shoulder to shoulder, bodies touching, but Harvey is looking at a tidy row of hills to his left, his gaze as far from her as it can get. There’s a list of things that Louis repeats inside her head ( _you would’ve done it before_ and _you should’ve said yes, who knows when I’ll actually want you to fuck me again_ and _better this way since I’m not wet anyway_ ). She would never say them out loud, too blatantly hurtful and unnecessary to admit, but she still thinks them. 

“Sorry,” she says. 

“We could go back to mine?” Harvey asks. He’s still not looking at her. “Mum’s working, I just don’t want to, like—”

“No, I know,” Louis says, and she does. “Just forget about that.” 

“I still want to,” he says. 

Along with the voices still spitting out insults in her head, Louis quietly scoffs. “Don’t worry about it.”

The ride back home is silent as well, Louis’ legs prickling sharply as they regain feeling in the warm car. Harvey keeps his hands to himself. There’s a long while until he has to leave for uni again, Louis knows, but spending any of it with her would probably be miserable for them both. 

He doesn’t kiss her goodbye when he gets out of the car, and she doesn’t realize it until she’s at home, hours later. 

 

\--

 

She manages to wait until evening to ring Zayn.

“Hi,” she answers. It’s a bit of a distracted greeting, one she usually gives. When Zayn picks up the phone, she integrates the conversation into whatever she’s doing at the time, giving it a chunk of her attention rather than the bulk of it. Just the familiarity is comforting. 

“Do you wanna go out?” Louis asks. She’s done and redone her makeup three times since the afternoon, looking more gaudy each time, just for something to do. The layers of golden eyeshadow have expanded up to her eyebrows, and she closes one eye and then the other, examining herself in the mirror while she waits for an answer. 

Eventually, Zayn replies, “Not really. I’m in the basement. Tapin’ up my robot so I can spray paint him.” 

“Tell me about your color palette,” Louis says. She grabs her earphones from the dresser and pops them in, plugging the cord into her phone to free up her hands. 

“ _Neon_ ,” Zayn says emphatically. “I got this sick, like, neon pink glow-in-the-dark can yesterday. You wanna come over here instead? I can play you some, like, Taio Cruz to get you in the clubbin’ mood.” 

As she applies a fourth coat of mascara, Louis hums like she’s considering it. “As long as I can wear a mini-skirt and grind all over you while you’re working. That’s the best way to get in the mood.” 

“Not gonna complain about that,” Zayn says. 

Louis smiles to herself, twisting the mascara tube closed and raising both eyebrows. “You oughta see my makeup.”

“FaceTime me,” Zayn says, and promptly hangs up. Louis taps to the right app and waits for the video to connect, batting her eyelashes dramatically once it does. “Nice. Proper club look. I bet you’d be beautiful in the dark.” 

“Yeah, bet you would too, darling.” Zayn’s hair is in a ponytail that might’ve started high up on her head but has begun wilting sadly to the side. The surgical mask she wears when she spray paints is hanging around her neck, speckled and crushed, and Louis spots bright pink dots on various parts of her face. “Have you got paint on your glasses?” 

“Just trying to bring a little color to my life,” Zayn says. She goes a bit cross-eyed trying to see any paint on the lenses without removing them. “You gonna come over, though? We’ve ordered in Shimla’s since mum’s working.” 

“I’m absolutely coming over, then,” Louis says. 

“In your mini-skirt,” Zayn reminds her. Louis winks as a reply before disconnecting the video. 

 

Instead of her mini-skirt, Louis shows up to Zayn’s house bare-faced and in a brand new pair of joggers, still snug against her body compared to all the other pairs that are growing thin and ragged with age. Zayn frowns even as she pulls Louis in to hug her. “Disappointed in this club look,” she sighs. 

They eat with Zayn’s dad and sisters, half of them sitting on the floor and the other half on the couch, the takeaway containers spread on the coffee table in front of them to avoid dirtying the ceramic dishes. Louis ends up leaning against Doniya’s shins and lets her try a braid that feels incredibly complicated, pulling her scalp tight. Waliyha crawls over after it’s completed and presses her cheek right against Louis’, turning her phone camera on to take a long series of photos of them together for Instagram, showing Louis the funniest ones again before posting them. 

Courteously, Zayn doesn’t say anything until after they’ve made their way around the sisters, kissing each of them goodnight as Zayn’s dad takes away their leftovers to store in the fridge. It’s still early yet, but the implied rule in the house is that once one of the girls closes her bedroom door, she’s checked out for the night. 

Zayn is quite good at knowing when Louis needs to have the door closed. She shuts it with her heel after ushering Louis into the room and immediately unbuttons her jeans, glancing around for something more comfortable. “So,” she says. 

“So,” Louis parrots. “So, I’m never going to have sex again.” 

“Poor you,” Zayn says agreeably. She kicks off her trousers and toes at a pile of clothes at the foot of her bed, peeking down at the contents hiding in the middle. “Out with it.” 

Sighing explosively, Louis climbs onto Zayn’s tiny bed and starfishes right in the middle, taking up all the space. “Your picnic idea went terribly wrong.” 

“What happened?” 

“Well, I took him to the spot I said I was going to and tried, like, initiating a little foreplay, if you will, but he wasn’t into it.” Zayn turns on the TV, turns off the main light, and is on her way to switch the bedside lamp on instead when Louis pathetically reaches out for her, latching onto the hand Zayn offers. “That’s not even the thing, though.” 

“What’s the thing?” Zayn asks. She sits next to Louis’ hip, rearranging their fingers to let them overlap naturally, and begins gently unraveling the braid that Doniya wove into Louis’ hair. 

“He didn’t even kiss me,” Louis sighs quietly, watching Zayn’s face. They’ve both turned into blue and black ghosts in the light of the television, shadows outlined only in the bright wash of artificial light. She can’t tell where Zayn’s looking. “Not hello or goodbye. He invited me to the play next weekend and I should want to go, but I don’t.” 

“You’ve got work next weekend,” Zayn reminds her, loosening the hair braided tight at her temple. “You wouldn’t be able to anyway.” 

“I would’ve,” Louis says, thinking out loud, “I would’ve two or three years ago. I would’ve put the effort in because, like, no matter how long I drove or how tired I was in the morning it would’ve been worth it.” 

Zayn’s quiet for a while, stroking her fingers through the long strands of Louis’ hair, now separated. “Is it still worth it?” 

Louis is quiet even longer, long enough that she can’t make herself answer, can’t push the thoughts in her head into an order that make sense to be spoken out loud. She curls into herself as far as she can, until her nose brushes Zayn’s bare thigh. “D’you wanna be the little spoon tonight, then?” 

She replies by leaning down to kiss Louis’ forehead, letting go of her fingers to grab the remote on her nightstand. “Under the blankets, I’m bloody freezing.” 

“Should’ve put some clothes on rather than taking them off, maybe,” Louis suggests. She’s still weighed down by the awkwardness of her last words with Harvey, all the details she doesn’t want to retell so soon, but being in Zayn’s company makes her own mind bearable. 

They both squirm underneath Zayn’s blanket, a lighter one she’s switched out for the impending warm weather, the thick, heavy duvet stored away for next winter. Zayn tangles her legs back in between Louis’ and hums, propping herself up on an elbow to flip through channels. “Those joggers feel nice, actually. Maybe better than a skirt.” 

“At the very least they’re warmer. Lucky for you,” Louis says. Settling against her favorite of Zayn’s pillows, Louis waits for her to choose a channel, curling her hand over Zayn’s hip and tapping at the soft bit of skin between her pants and t-shirt. 

“Doctor Who?” 

“Eh,” Louis shrugs. 

“Hollyoaks marathon,” Zayn says, ambivalently. 

“Rather not,” Louis agrees. 

A moment of silence passes - relative silence, with the snatches of conversation between channels - before Zayn exclaims, “Aha! Skins.” Triumphantly, she stretches to place the remote back on her nightstand before settling against Louis’ chest, sharing the pillow. Louis crowds in close, a bit more eager for a cuddle than usual, and presses her cheek against the back of Zayn’s neck. 

“If I ever moved in with him I’d need you to come with me,” she says. Zayn finds Louis’ hand on her hip and tugs it gently until Louis’ arm is around her waist, linking their fingers together again. 

“Not sure I’m up for three-way bed sharing,” Zayn admits. 

“Split custody,” Louis says, “you get me weekends, he gets me weekdays.” 

“A two and five split? Hardly fair.” 

“Did I mention they’re four-day weekends?” Louis drags the tip of her nose along Zayn’s skin until she reaches the tempting slope of her neck, pressing a light kiss there. 

“I’ll just take the weekdays,” Zayn sighs. Louis kisses her again in the same spot, a few times in a row, a little overcome with affection. “I need you here. ‘Specially if you’re gonna keep that up.” 

“You get the weekdays,” Louis agrees. She nuzzles into the curve of Zayn’s shoulder and means to end it there, but her lips graze the stretch of skin above her collar that’s covered in goosebumps, so she kisses back to the first spot her mouth touched, finding it easily. “You smell nice,” she murmurs. 

“Feels nice,” Zayn says back. She smells like paint the strongest down by her t-shirt, still in the one she was wearing on FaceTime, flecks of paint glowing in the darkness hiding under the blanket. Louis’ favorite spot is where Zayn always sprays her perfume first, the very last place that the scent fades from, going from spicy and complex at the start to smooth and lazy by the end, muted. When she edges closer to kiss behind Zayn’s ear, she smells like her shampoo, a buttery vanilla cream underneath everything else. 

Louis realizes what she’s doing as she’s dragging more kisses down the line of Zayn’s neck, nearly ready to sink her teeth into the tender spot that makes Zayn’s breathing hitch when she reaches it, just behind where she placed her first set of kisses. Laughing a little to herself, Louis buries her face fully into Zayn’s neck. “Wow, sorry,” she says, muffled. 

“S’alright,” Zayn mumbles, squeezing Louis’ fingers. “Bit _sensual_ today, aren’t ya?” 

“Told you, m’never gonna have a shag again. Must be getting to me.” Louis moves her mouth away from Zayn but stays tucked around her body, licking nervously at her lips. 

“M’sure you’ll have a shag again if that’s your foreplay technique,” Zayn says, looking over her shoulder. She’s smirking, Louis thinks, from what she can see in the dark. 

“High praise from you, innit?” 

“Save all my good reviews for the best,” Zayn agrees. Louis swallows. They both turn back to the TV, fingers still intertwined, and try to pick up on the plot they’ve missed since the beginning; Louis watches the episode halfheartedly, above the frame of Zayn’s neck, highlighted in silvery blue. 

 

\--

 

The next day, Louis is winning _spectacularly_ against Zayn at an impromptu tickle war when her phone chimes the first time. She ignores it, digging her fingers into the fleshiest parts of Zayn’s waist, her weakest spot, but two more messages come in, one right after the other, and she groans. 

“Bloody hell,” she says loudly, breathing hard. Zayn whines high in her throat in between hysterical giggles, trying to calm down, still squirming. Louis plops down just hard enough to knock the wind out of Zayn once more, sitting right in the cradle of her skinny hips, and reaches for her phone that’s gotten sucked into the folds of Zayn’s sheets. 

True to her usual form, Zayn waits until the second Louis’ distracted to dive back into the fight, surging forward all of a sudden to knock Louis onto her back, her legs still splayed around Zayn’s hips. As she’s going down, though, Louis spots a flash of what appears to be a naked body part just as her phone goes flying to the other side of the mattress. 

“Wait! Wait, wait wait,” Louis pleads; she places one hand over Zayn’s entire face, effectively halting the fingers trying to slip under her shirt. “Pause. This is important.” 

“The text?” Her question is muffled by Louis’ hand, so she removes it and nods. “Thirty seconds,” Zayn allows, stretching to reach Louis’ phone for her to make sure she doesn’t lose the upper hand from her position. 

Left on the screen in plain view is a photo from Harvey, a shot of his hard cock from his own point of view, the head pointed directly at the camera. Underneath are two messages, just text, _Miss u_ and _Still want u_. Louis clears her throat and quickly deletes the photo, unable to look at it and take him seriously. _Still want u_ , still, even though I didn’t before, she thinks. 

Zayn pauses in her countdown, only at twenty-one. “What?” 

She tosses the phone back down. “Harvey’s just sent me a lovely photo of his willy.” 

Louis can feel Zayn’s body go lax, not up to the fight now. “He hasn’t got great timing, has he?” 

“He really hasn’t. That’s the first message he’s sent me since he left,” Louis says, sighing heavily.

“Maybe it’s just meant to be a naughty make-up photo. You ought to be excusing yourself to the loo to have a quiet wank, as well,” Zayn teases. 

“What kind of girl do you take me for?” Her face burns a little at the idea, holing up in Zayn’s loo to get herself off, and she tries to adjust to the spiral of arousal worming its way through the cold disappointment that’s settled in her belly since reading Harvey’s messages. Zayn shrugs. “I couldn’t use that as wank material, anyway, no matter the circumstances. He took it, like,” she mimes holding her phone from the angle Harvey must’ve taken his picture, pushing her hips up against Zayn’s belly, “I felt like it was staring me down.” 

“Neither of you are very good at this,” Zayn says. “Pezza knew how to do phone sex, pictures and that. Mine were proper awful, though.” 

With that, Louis suddenly wants to pet Zayn’s hair, a residual urge left over from months ago, from never knowing if the pain of that breakup would be too sharp for Zayn to talk about. Instead she sighs wistfully, letting her body go limp with a concentrated effort, forcing herself not to dwell yet. “I’d imagine a lesbian knows how to go about sex properly all around.” 

“You’d imagine right,” Zayn says, meaningfully. “To be honest, I think she’s the only one who’s really paid proper attention to my tits.” She reorganizes their limbs until their legs are slotted together and looks around fruitlessly for a pillow, flopping her head down onto the flat mattress beside Louis’ shoulder when she realizes they’ve ended up at the foot of the bed. 

“Lots of times I’m not even sure I bothered to take my bra off,” Louis admits. Thinking back to the last time before she made a twat out of herself, all she can remember is a sense of exhaustion, too sleepy to make the effort for good sex most of the time. “Actually, even when I did, it’s like…” she trails off, waving a hand vaguely. 

“Not great?” Zayn supplies. 

“Not great,” Louis agrees. She moves her body away enough to get her hand between them and paws at Zayn’s chest, palm flat; Zayn raises an eyebrow, and Louis rubs jerkily, keeping her face carefully blank as she watches Zayn begin to struggle holding in her laughter. “That’s about standard.” 

“You’ve been shagging how many years and he still does it like _that_?” 

“Right, I mean... if I tell him what to do, he’ll do it. But _why_ do I still need to tell him what to do?” Louis pats Zayn’s chest again, right in the middle this time, over the red printed lips there now. It’s quite cathartic to complain about Harvey’s prowess, as unfair as it might be. “It’s like he just, like, plays with them.”

“Playing with them’s good, though, if you do it right. Especially with _your_ nipples,” Zayn says. She pushes herself up onto one elbow and Louis looks up at her face, allowing herself to blush again. 

“Don’t talk about my nipples, they’re very sensitive.” 

“I know they are,” Zayn agrees. She ignores the pun, instead reaching over to drag her fingertips down the slope of Louis’ breast. The touch is feather light; Louis hardly feels it through the dual layers of her bandeau and the t-shirt she borrowed from Zayn this morning, but it makes her suck in a sudden breath anyway. Her nipples both tighten up almost immediately, hard enough to be visible through her clothes. 

“My only weakness,” Louis breathes, attempting to sound like a vanquished superhero whose secret has been unleashed. Mostly she feels a little light-headed and a little guilty, more turned on from her mate’s teasing than a photo of her boyfriend’s cock. 

“And he should be taking advantage.” Zayn taps the very tip of Louis’ nipple with her index finger and hums when Louis gasps. “You’re seriously so sensitive, bet it’d be easy to get you goin’ like that.” 

Louis rubs at her chest, focused on making her nipples go back down; it only serves to keep them taut, grazing against her palms. Instead she slides her hand down her belly, avoiding Zayn’s eyes, at a loss for how to reply. 

“Does he really not, like, know what to do?” Zayn asks. She rests her hand high on Louis’ ribs, the curve of her thumb and forefinger molding along the edge of Louis’ breast. Louis brings her hand back up to hold Zayn’s elbow, turning her face away to hide how heavily she’s breathing from just this, the hint of contact. 

“He’ll do what I ask him to,” Louis says, quietly, a repetition of earlier. 

Zayn’s thumb brushes up in a wide sweep, along the elastic of Louis’ bandeau and still inches from her nipple, but close enough to make her shiver. “What do you ask him to do?” 

The question reverberates inside her, knocking around in her chest as she tries to catch her breath. Louis turns her head back to face Zayn and feels up her forearm, circling her fingers around Zayn’s wrist. “Usually just put his hands where I want ‘em,” she whispers, afraid her voice will catch if she speaks louder. 

“What if he does terribly?” Zayn’s hand slides up to cup her breast, fingers squeezing carefully in a poor imitation of Louis’ earlier grope. Her hands are miles smaller than Harvey’s but equally as gentle, fingers spread apart so Louis’ nipple catches in the V formed between two of them. 

It’s an out, blatant as anything despite how Zayn’s fully touching her now, and Louis should take it. The simplest thing to do would be laugh, swat at Zayn’s shoulder and roll away, pin her for another round of tickling. It doesn’t feel like a joke, the calculated way that Zayn allows her fingers to drag back down at a wide angle, two of her fingertips catching the point of Louis’ nipple on the way. 

“Just touch me,” Louis whispers. She swallows against the dry dread in her throat and flits her eyes nervously back and forth between Zayn’s, grappling for different words. 

“Louis,” Zayn says, syrupy and slow, a sweet warning. It’s the second time she’s been warned like this, lately, but this time is new. She’s never heard Zayn aroused before. Louis’ afraid that she’ll pull back and nearly begins withdrawing into herself, preparing for the aftermath, but Zayn tips forward instead to gradually close the gap between them. 

The wait is excruciating. In his empty dorm room hours away from her, Louis’ boyfriend is touching himself and thinking of her, how he misses her, how he fucked her last; every second that drags on without action feeds the guilt that has rooted itself in her chest, growing ravenous thinking of him. It has to fight the mounting anticipation that swells with every touch of Zayn’s body on hers, though, and guilt is nearly swallowed whole when Zayn’s chest crowds against hers, their lips meeting quietly. 

Zayn is the first woman she’s ever kissed. Louis’ lips are bare but Zayn’s wearing a waxy balm that spreads between their mouths, tasteless and smooth. Zayn isn’t tasteless; the kiss opens up quickly, unlike every other first kiss Louis’ had, and when Zayn licks into her Louis’ met with the cold, clean taste of spearmint that’s built upon a foundation of ash. Toying with the jewelry Zayn wears in her tongue feels like smoking in itself, a nicotine rush as Zayn surges closer with a whine after Louis licks at the barbell and sucks Zayn further into her. 

It’s so smooth, Zayn’s smooth lips, smooth tongue, smooth hair falling past her shoulders and onto Louis’ neck, smooth chin where Louis’ only known prickling growth to scrape at her skin. She tilts her head to try to kiss more deeply and Zayn leans into it so seamlessly, the side of her nose nuzzling against Louis’ just as closely as their lips. Whether it’s the best kiss she’s had or not, it’s the most all-encompassing, and Louis forgets even the insistent pull in her nipples until Zayn shifts, her chest dragging against Louis’, making them both pause to gasp in an extra breath. Louis can’t bring herself to break away, too enticed by the way her mind stops racing when she’s focused on kissing Zayn; she touches the tip of her tongue to Zayn’s lower lip and then kisses there, hoping to ward off any thoughts at all as long as their mouths maintain the barest contact. 

Zayn’s just started to kiss back, light enough to barely feel past the sheen of balm, when Waliyha gives Zayn’s door a single knock in passing. “Food’s done if you’re hungry,” she shouts. 

The sound startles them both and breaks the connection, leaving a silence in its absence that’s almost as awful as waiting for Zayn to kiss her. Worse, maybe, now that it’s happened. They’re still close, watching each other with their legs twisted together and nipples brushing, and Louis’ heart feels like it’s trying to sear through her flesh, beating fast enough to burn her from the inside. 

“Shit,” Louis speaks first, clamping her eyes shut. “Shit, shit, shit.” 

Zayn sits up but doesn’t say anything, curling into herself beside Louis’ hips on the mattress. 

“Fuck,” Louis says. 

In the next handful of seconds, Louis covers her face with her hands and considers every thought that comes rushing back at once, the ones she’d hidden in Zayn’s mouth. She considers going home and calling Harvey, confessing, apologizing, moving in with him, marrying him. She considers staying in Zayn’s bed. When she sits up and looks, finally, Zayn’s anxiously rubbing at her lips with the tips of her fingers. 

“I think I want to break up with Harvey,” she says. 

Zayn’s hand slowly stops moving and she takes her time to respond, “Were you thinking that before or after this just happened, though?” 

“Does that really matter? Like, how I got there? I’m there, and it’s fucking with me, Zayn,” Louis says, awkwardly shrill. 

“It does really matter actually, yeah, to me. Because I need to know how much a part of it I play for you to come out and say that right now.” Zayn draws her knees up to her chest and rests her chin on one of them, looking by turns concerned and annoyed. 

“A pretty fucking big part, I’d say,” Louis says. “You’re a massive part, or like, even the _main_ part of why I don’t want to move in with him.” 

“You could still see me if you did leave,” Zayn says quietly.

“Yeah, but do you really want me to? I never see him and that’s what’s killing it. Or, like, it probably already killed it for me. I don’t want that for me and you, too. I love him still, but I don’t need to see him like I used to need it, like… it feels like I’ve stopped seeing him as somebody I could sleep in the same bed with every night.” Stupidly, saying the words out loud makes Louis sadder than thinking them inside her head, and tears start to build behind her eyes when she pushes on. “I don’t wanna do that to him, but it’s not fair to make him think I still want to be with him, and it’s not fair for me to stay anymore.” 

“No, it’s not fair, babe,” Zayn says softly. Louis stares straight down at her own knees when the first tears spill out, making tracks for more to follow. 

“And then I, like, I want _you_ , too,” Louis says, rushed and watery, “because you already know everything you could know about me and you’re always there. When he asked me, I thought up all those excuses but I was mostly worried about how I’d ever leave without taking you with me.” Sniffling loudly, Louis brings up both hands to wipe her cheeks dry and groans into her palms, embarrassed, delaying whatever response Zayn will have. 

Zayn scoots closer and pulls Louis into her side, wrapping an arm around her back until Louis leans in heavily and holds onto Zayn’s waist, trying not to cry into her neck. 

“Love you,” Zayn mumbles into her hair. “Let’s do one thing at a time, yeah? We can talk about that part later. You gotta talk to him first and figure out what you’re gonna do.”

Louis presses her palms flat to Zayn’s body and her cheek to Zayn’s shoulder, feeling out the shape of this person she might be choosing over another. She might know the shape of Zayn better already, anyway. 

“I know,” she says. 

 

\--

 

Louis doesn’t reply back to Harvey’s messages, and the only thing he sends afterward is a single _Sorry_ before going as silent as her. She goes home and avoids telling anyone what’s happened, coming out of her room only to watch the girls when her mum’s off to work. After nearly a week and a series of texts from Zayn, ranging from slightly worried to insulted to angry and back to worried again, she sends _I’m ringing him today_ and then nervously stares at Harvey’s number in her contacts, with the little heart icon she’d placed beside his name. 

The first time she hits the button to call, she ends it immediately before it properly starts ringing and then checks every single social media app she has, just to waste time, before navigating back to her phone log. 

The second time, she lets it ring, hesitating long enough in putting it to her ear that Harvey’s answered by the time she does. “Hiya,” he says. 

“Hi,” Louis says back. 

There’s a silence that stretches on for several long seconds, and Louis very nearly hangs up and starts over. Before she can consider it too seriously, Harvey says, “Haven’t heard from you in a little while.” 

“Yeah, I’ve been, um…” she pauses, searching for the right word, a truthful one. “Like. Thinking.” 

“Louis,” Harvey says. He sounds almost pleading, like he already knows where this is going. Probably, he does. 

Embarrassingly, Louis’ barely said anything and still has to fight the shake in her voice when she asks, “What are we doing, at this point?” 

“You don’t have to move in.” 

“I know,” Louis says, kind and composed as she can manage. “And I’m not going to. But what’s that leave us with, just this? This, like, once every few weeks kind of thing until you graduate?” 

“We’re already working with that, we’re working around it,” Harvey insists. “We have done since the start, practically, right?” 

His voice is growing tight, and Louis frowns, wishing she could do this and see his face. Still, however cruel it seems to end something over the phone, it would’ve been more cruel to her to save it up until the next time they saw each other. 

“We aren’t working around it quite so well anymore, darling,” she says, sadly. 

Harvey sniffles quickly and then sighs. It breaks Louis’ heart. She wants to comfort him, coddle him even, pull his head to her chest and tell him not to cry, but she has to pinch tight at the bridge of her nose to uselessly try and stop her own tears. 

“It just feels like such a waste. Three years we’ve done to end up here?” He sounds petulant, frustrated. 

“Hazza, come on,” she tries. She has to sniffle a bit too before going on. “You were hardly 17 when we met, we didn’t get together with the end goal of, like, marriage in mind. Nothing’s been wasted.” 

“Hasn’t it? We’ve been building on something that’s just ending now, seems like a bit of a waste to me.” 

“Stop it,” Louis says, firmly now. “I’m not trying to get rid of you. I love you.” 

From the way he sounds when he says “I know,” Louis imagines that Harvey can tell how she means it, this time. 

“It’s just, like… This shit happens so slowly that you don’t notice it, doesn’t it? We— we do so much of the same stuff but it’s not the same as it was, the end result is gonna be different than we probably hoped it would be. And it’s not bad, I don’t think. It’s just…” 

“It’s sad,” Harvey finishes, and Louis hides her face behind one hand, as if he can see her crying. 

“It’s sad,” she agrees, muffled by her palm. Louis thinks of Zayn, and the guilt nearly wears her down; she almost tells him, taking in a deep breath to start the confession, but lets it leave her lungs all at once before the words come out. Selfishly, she decides to keep it to herself. It’s not about Zayn, not as much as it would sound like it is if she told him. It’s about them. 

“Alright,” Harvey says after a bit; his voice is thick when he’s upset, and Louis has to strain to make out what he’s saying through the accent sometimes. “I get it. I don’t like it, I fucking hate it and I don’t want it, but I get it. I’ve got to call my mum and have a proper cry, though, and I’m sure you’ve had to hear me doing that quite enough.” 

“Don’t be angry with me,” Louis pleads, sullen and pathetic, before he’s even finished his sentence. 

Harvey sighs. “I’m— I’m not _angry_. I’m sad. This is actually… this is why I asked you to move with me to begin with, because it felt like we were at one of the, um, just a crossroads. Like if we didn’t pick one way, we’d pick the other. And this isn’t the one I wanted us to end up picking.” 

“I’m sorry,” Louis sniffs. “I don’t _want_ it either, but… probably would’ve ended up here even if we’d taken that other way, too, and then it’d be so, so much worse.” 

“I know. I’m gonna ring off, now, love. Not trying to get rid of you either, but I’m gonna need a little while.” 

“I know,” Louis repeats, “I know, me too.”

“Bye, Lou,” he says. 

Louis tries to reciprocate, but ends up waiting for the tone that signals the end of the call. As soon as Harvey’s gone, she gives in and lets herself sob. 

 

\--

 

 _Done deal_ , Louis texts Zayn four hours later, after she’s woken up from the spontaneous nap she fell into, post-Harvey. 

Zayn sends back a single sad emoticon, _):_ , along with a second message: _Let me know._

 

\--

 

Three days later, Zayn loses her patience. Usually she’s the one who doesn’t reply to messages or return calls for days at a time, accidentally leaving her phone in her uni classrooms or letting the battery run down where it’s wedged between her wall and her mattress; quite regularly, Louis has to contact a sister or two just to get Zayn’s attention. When Zayn lets herself in through the front door, she has to raise her voice to be heard over the racket of the twins launching themselves at her, full speed, “Just making sure we’re all alive in here, still.” 

Phoebe asks, “Are you here for Lou? She’s been a right pain, hasn’t she?” 

“Watch it,” Louis says, popping her head up over the backrest of the sofa to watch the three of them in the doorway. 

“She’s in mourning,” Lottie says, not looking up from her phone. 

“Phoebs isn’t, though. She’s been plotting behind my back this whole time since she fancies Harvey,” Louis teases, keeping her voice light. Daisy cackles at a nearly alarming frequency while Phoebe buries herself face-first against Zayn’s belly, hiding in embarrassment. “You’ll get your chance in a few years, kid. Maybe he wants to keep it in the family.” 

Fizzy and Zayn both emphatically say her name, a semi-disgusted _Louis!_ , to which she merely shrugs. In a fit of drama, Daisy throws herself to the ground at Zayn’s feet and pretends to gag, making sure she’s a part of the group disgust. 

“Alright, alright,” Louis says, “get your hugs in, I’m confiscating Zayn. Adult chat.” 

“Boy chat,” Phoebe says, still muffled against Zayn’s shirt even as she clings on for a hug. 

“Might do,” Louis agrees. “Lottie?” 

“You’re alright,” Lottie says. She stands and pockets her phone now, placing an affectionate hand on the top of Louis’ head before going to pluck the twins out of Zayn’s grasp. “You’ve got literally, like, ten minutes before bed.” 

As both twins wail a simultaneous _Nooooo_ , Louis leads Zayn to her room and shuts the door, softening the sounds of all her sisters. 

“Don’t seem too broken up, yeah?” Zayn asks even as she’s pulling Louis into a hug, one hand firm at the back of her head as if she’d consider refusing. 

“Not sure that I am,” Louis answers. “Not like I should be, at least. Not like a fucking normal person would be.” 

Without replying, Zayn sways them side to side a little; Louis huffs out a laugh and holds onto her, arms latched around Zayn’s waist. For several long seconds they rock together, not speaking, until Louis sighs. 

“Sorry I’ve ignored you,” she says, quietly. 

As she pulls back, Zayn says, “I understood for a bit. But I need to know how you are.” She climbs up the side of the bed that Louis never sleeps on and settles against a pile of pillows at the headboard, patting the spot beside her. “Step into my office.” 

“I’m _relieved_ ,” Louis blurts out, unmoving, “I’m relieved and I feel bloody fucking awful about it.” 

Zayn’s face softens, and she holds out her hand instead. “C’mere, babe.” 

This time, she goes. Louis lets Zayn tuck her underneath her arm, and unlike the last time she was in this position, she doesn’t feel like crying; she rests her head in the crook of Zayn’s neck and exhales. 

“So,” she starts, “I had a good cry with mum right after I told you. She gets it, at least, been through it before so she doesn’t like, blame me or whatever. Lottie and Fizz have been absolutely incredible to me, though, so much better than I would’ve been as a teenager, Jesus. They’re offering so much to do with the twins so I haven’t got to babysit when mum’s working, and I don’t really need them to but… they’re such good kids.” 

“Got a good role model,” Zayn says. Louis gently nudges Zayn’s jaw with the top of her head, a gentle _shut up_. 

“But I’m not sad. I don’t feel, like— it doesn’t feel anything like how I thought a breakup would feel,” Louis continues. “I don’t even know how to describe it. I’m happier than I am sad because I feel like now me and him can be better for each other without trying to keep this thing going when it wasn’t working. And I’m just fucking, like… the only reason I’m sad is that I know he’s not feeling that yet.” 

“Give it a bit. It was the same kinda thing with me and Pez,” Zayn says. Her arm is wrapped around Louis’ neck, hand pressed just between her collarbones; she fidgets slowly with the chain of Louis’ necklace, gently scraping her nail against the metal. “I got it, eventually. I was out of my mind for a bit, but I got it. He’ll get it.” 

“And you still love her,” Louis says, a question formed as a statement. 

“I still love her,” Zayn agrees. “I see her at uni and it’s fine, we hang out and it’s fine. It’s not the end of the world for him, and he’ll figure it out soon. You haven’t left it on a bad note.” 

Weakly, Louis laughs, “Yeah, not as if I cheated on him, is it?” 

Zayn’s silent for a long moment. “I’m guessing you didn’t tell him?” 

“Didn’t see the point,” Louis admits, shaking her head against Zayn’s shoulder. Zayn’s nail misses the chain of her necklace and scratches lightly over her skin, raising goosebumps. “It’s just, like. It’s not something I fucking _do_ , but I did it. It was over to me with him by then, so I’ve been trying to tell myself that makes it not quite so bad, but it doesn’t matter. I still did it, and I’m not telling him because then I’d never get that, what you and Perrie’ve got. Good role model still, yeah?” 

Zayn stiffens, like she wants to pull away or apologize, but instead she says, “He’d hate us both if you told him.” 

“He’ll probably hate us both anyway,” Louis mumbles, closing her eyes for the rest, “because I still want you. And I dunno how much longer I can ignore that part of this whole thing.” 

Under her head, Louis can hear the long stream of air go through Zayn’s lungs when she inhales, sighing out slowly. “I can’t be good for you to talk to about this, like. I’m so fuckin’ biased, Lou, all I can focus on is how I want to kiss you when it’s alright and not gonna end with somebody crying again.” 

Slowly, Louis sits up; Zayn lets her arm drop away and folds her hands in her own lap, not meeting Louis’ eyes when Louis looks at her. “I’m not gonna cry,” she says. 

Zayn steals a glance in Louis’ direction but shakes her head. “I can’t make this feel worse for you.” 

“I already said I feel relieved, like, do you think that has nothing to do with you? You’re a part of that.” Louis waits until Zayn finally looks at her, full-on and attentive, before she says again, “I’m not gonna cry, Zayn.” 

It’s an uncomfortable stare to hold, watching Zayn watch her as she tries to decide what to do. She looks how Louis feels: hesitant but so ready, unsure but seconds from losing her resolve. Zayn breaks, her gaze dropping down to Louis’ mouth and then down further to the sheets between them before she looks all the way back up again, chewing her lower lip nervously. 

“Zayn,” Louis mumbles; she moves first, reaching out with an unsteady hand to hold Zayn’s jaw, thumb against her cheek and fingers hidden behind her ear. Zayn tilts forward compliantly, looking blatantly at Louis’ lips now and parting her own when Louis’ thumb sweeps across the corner of her mouth. 

Louis closes the distance, this time. Leaning in to catch Zayn in a kiss, she’s met with bare lips, drier and warm but not nearly as hesitant as the first time. Zayn places both hands on either side of Louis’ neck and guides her in the kiss, making Louis gasp between their open mouths so soon, already in over her head. They both escalate at the same time, Louis curling her body in closer while Zayn’s tongue slips into her mouth, and all Louis can think of is that they need to be quiet in case one of the girls walks by her door. 

Before, the first time, there was a reason to stop. It took the shape of the line that had always been there between them, and even after they went past it, it didn’t break; instead it stretched, took the form of their disobedience and flung them backwards, well within their boundaries. 

Now, the line’s snapped. 

“Think I need a time-out,” she whispers, sliding her hand down Zayn’s neck to her shoulder.

Zayn nods like she understands but still leaves a trail of kisses along the line of Louis’ jaw, stopping to nuzzle against her earlobe. “Want me to go?” 

Belly twisting with nerves, Louis says, “Want you to let me turn the light out.” 

Zayn pauses, mouth against Louis’ cheek, before she nods again. 

The distance across the room feels like enough for Louis to calm down, taking her time to shuffle back across the floor after she flips her light switch off and locks her door. She’s hyper-aware of her own breathing, trying to keep it deep and slow; she can feel Zayn’s eyes on her, especially when she pauses beside the bed and pulls her top over her head. 

“Louis,” she mumbles, voice pitched low, and Louis swallows. 

“Getting pyjamas on,” she says, unhooking the clasp of her bra. Zayn can see an alright silhouette, she knows, the light still coming through the curtains over Louis’ window strong enough to illuminate her; she exhales when the air hits her nipples, filling them out. Louis crouches down to rummage in one of her dresser drawers, pawing inside blindly for a vest to put on. After she’s pulled the top over her head and tugged her hair out of the collar, she sits on the edge of her mattress and fumbles around on the nightstand for her iPod, needing to drown out the sound of herself trying to keep control. 

Zayn crawls over, curling a hand around Louis’ hip and gently headbutting the back of Louis’ arm until she lifts it to let her in closer. She turns her face toward Louis’ body, lightly nuzzling her nose up against the bare side of her breast, the skin peeking out from the armholes of Louis’ top. 

The soft contact is already enough for Louis; her pulse speeds up suddenly, and she tries hard to keep her fingers from shaking where she’s still scrolling through her iPod for a suitable playlist. Zayn kisses her breast, lips half on and half off the fabric of her vest, and Louis gives up, just hitting shuffle on her full library. The music comes out of the speakers already set up under her nightstand, and Louis sets her iPod down to put a hand in Zayn’s hair, fingers sifting through the strands. 

Zayn curls in closer when Louis focuses her full attention on the two of them, unable to stall any longer. She slips her fingers up under the hem of Louis’ top and kisses her again, more blatant this time, mouth so close to Louis’ nipple through the fabric that she has to clench her thighs together before she can stop herself. 

“Zayn,” Louis whispers; she can hardly hear herself over the music, already thankful for the sounds it’s sure to swallow. 

“Yeah,” Zayn murmurs back. “Don’t think you need to wear this to bed, if m’honest.” She wraps her free arm around Louis’ middle, chilly fingers sneaking under her clothes to rest against her belly. 

Louis turns her body as subtly as she can, cupping the back of Zayn’s head. She already knows she’s getting wet, blood rushing down between her legs almost fast enough to make her lightheaded. Shakily, she whispers, “Take it off me, then.” 

Their eyes have adjusted enough that Louis can see Zayn look up at her. She keeps her eyes open, deliberately, dragging her mouth from the side of Louis’ breast until she feels the hard ridge of her nipple under the fabric. Louis drops her head forward and grips Zayn’s hair tightly, too tightly, probably, fighting to keep from whimpering. 

“Shit,” Louis pants. She’s too turned on too fast, nipples aching with how badly she wants Zayn to touch them. Zayn licks her once, tentative but pointed, and Louis relents; “Please.” 

Zayn moves one of her hands up to ease the neckline of Louis’ top down until it’s tucked under her breast. The hem digs in but her nipple tightens all over again, propped up and pointing toward Zayn’s mouth, the ache only getting worse with the passing seconds. 

“Should leave it like that,” Zayn says. She’s so close that the breath from her words tickles over Louis’ skin like a physical touch, but Louis wants it to be _wet_ , wants to feel Zayn’s warm tongue right on her bare skin, wants to be sucked. 

“Zayn, please,” Louis tries. It feels like she’s sweating already, overheated and half exposed, one tit out with Zayn’s mouth close enough that she could brush her nipple against Zayn’s lips herself, if she wanted. She waits. 

She waits, and Zayn pushes herself up, away from her chest, kissing her neck and her jaw instead. “C’mere, c’mon,” she murmurs. Zayn kisses her mouth and Louis whines right into it, gripping Zayn’s hair tight again; she has to bring her free hand up, too, pinching her own nipple between her fingers to try and ease the ache herself.

“Don’t fucking _tease_ me like that,” Louis breathes.

Zayn smiles against her mouth, “Come lie down.” She slowly inches away from Louis and lets her hands linger as she goes, fingertips still making contact with Louis’ hip as she settles back on her side of the bed. Louis turns to crawl up beside her and purposely shifts with more movement than necessary, drawing the neckline of her shirt back up to cover her chest; it helps a little, makes her feel less vulnerable. She presses close to Zayn and throws an arm over her waist, eager to feel her mouth properly, wherever Zayn will use it. 

It’s not dark enough around them now that Louis can’t see, but she pretends it is just so she can nuzzle her way across Zayn’s face, lips touching her cheek and chin before finally meeting Zayn’s mouth. In the first few seconds of the kiss, the track changes to something slower, shaping the way they move their mouths together. Zayn takes her time, holding Louis’ bottom lip between her own until a full set of beats in the song passes by, sucking gently. Their heads tilt together, lips part together, and tongues touch together; Louis lets her hands roam, feeling out the shape of Zayn’s spine over her clothes until she finds bare skin. Zayn follows her lead but takes it one step further, sliding her palm up Louis’ stomach underneath her vest until she can stroke her thumb along the bottom edge of Louis’ breast. 

“Won’t tease this time,” she mumbles, grazing the backs of her fingers upward until she reaches Louis’ nipple, staying there. Louis gasps and Zayn catches it with her mouth, kissing her again as she turns her hand to rub Louis properly, fingertips circling slowly around her nipple. 

Louis stretches one leg forward and wedges it between Zayn’s, satisfying the urge to squirm without displacing Zayn’s hand. It’s already hard to keep up with the kiss and she gets distracted by the easy pinch of Zayn’s fingers, leaving her mouth parted as she breathes without putting in the effort of the kiss. 

“Knew this’d get you goin’,” Zayn says, ducking down to drop a kiss on the edge of Louis’ collarbone. She pushes Louis’ vest up to uncover her chest entirely this time, fabric bunching up under her arms, but Louis can’t make herself raise them to take it off. Instead, she rubs up Zayn’s back and twists her fingers through Zayn’s hair again. 

“I’m-- yeah,” she tries, “I am, I don’t know, probably wouldn’t need much else, to be honest.” 

“Not much else, like, d’you mean you can come like this?” Zayn asks; she bends down more and kisses right over Louis’ nipple, sucking it softly, and Louis moans as quietly as she can. 

“Yeah, I could, I think I could,” she whispers, cupping the back of Zayn’s head to try and keep her there. Zayn doesn’t pull back, locking their legs tighter together and sucking at Louis in measured pulses, a half second off the beat of the song that’s playing. It’s impossible for Louis to keep still like this, rolling her hips forward into nothing, too far away from the line of Zayn’s thigh to get pressure from anything other than her own body clenching down. She holds Zayn’s head to her chest with one hand and feels up her side with the other, pushing her t-shirt up just like Zayn did to her.

“I don’t want to, though,” she says, fingers shaking as they slide up Zayn’s ribs, “I don’t want to yet.” 

“Whatever you want,” Zayn says. She pulls away from Louis’ chest and strokes a thumb over her nipple instead, spreading the wetness from her mouth. Every single touch sends a jolt right through the center of Louis’ body, but without the suction to focus on she exhales harshly and tries to collect her thoughts. 

“Want to impress you with my stamina, obviously,” she says. Her voice isn’t nearly as steady as Zayn’s is, and she can’t tell if the pounding pulse at her fingertips is from Zayn or herself. 

“M’not bothered by your stamina,” Zayn murmrs; Louis can sense her closer now, so she tips her head forward until they find each others’ mouths again for a kiss. “You’ve told me before you can go more than once, anyway.” 

“Stop doing that,” Louis whispers, holding her breath as she feels higher up Zayn’s body, palming over her breast. 

Zayn hums against her lips, low and aroused. “What?”

“Remembering all the things I’ve ever said about getting myself off,” she says, leading into another kiss before Zayn can responds. Her fingers tug at Louis’ nipple, and Louis groans, louder than she’d like. It feels nice with Zayn under her palm, the gentle swell of her breast different from how heavy Louis’ feel to her, and she squeezes to try and make Zayn react, too. 

Her nipple is hard and tight, so Louis flicks the tip of her finger over it gently, back and forth, the way she does to herself. Zayn’s jaw slowly goes slack, and Louis ends the kiss to look at her face, watching all the tension draw itself into the furrow of Zayn’s brows while her mouth stays open. 

“Why’re you still wearing these, then?” Louis whispers, pinching Zayn’s nipple once before feeling down her stomach, fingers brushing the metal button at the front of Zayn’s shorts.

Zayn’s response is to open her eyes and watch Louis’ face as she reaches down to meet her fingers, both of them fumbling to undo the button and pull down the zip. She has to roll onto her back in order to lift her hips off the bed, so Louis sits up to tug her vest off, tossing it on the floor with her clothes from earlier. “Top too,” Louis insists, letting herself rub down the soft plane of Zayn’s stomach. “New rule, must be nude to be in my bed.” 

“Good rule,” Zayn agrees. She leaves her underwear on, but kicks her shorts to the foot of the bed and pulls her top off like Louis says, dropping it beside her. “Do knickers count, then?” 

“They do for you.” It’s impossible for Louis to keep from staring, even in the dark. Zayn looks beautiful in greyscale, resting back on her elbows and watching Louis watch her; Louis wants to turn the lights back on now, to see if she could suck Zayn’s nipples into a darker shade or to see what colors she is between her legs. “They definitely do for you.” 

“You too, yeah?” Zayn says. She obliges though, lying flat again to push her knickers down past her thighs. Louis dismisses her, “Later,” and helps idly, mostly looking for an excuse to run her fingertips along Zayn’s thigh, causing the fabric to roll under their hands. Without pausing to question herself, Louis trails her fingers back over Zayn’s stomach and down as low as she can go, palm smoothing down the short, coarse hair between Zayn’s legs, fingers just shy of making contact. Zayn stops with her knickers still around her ankles and Louis sucks in a breath when she spreads her thighs wider, more than inviting, _asking_ Louis to touch her. 

Louis bends back down to kiss the center of Zayn’s chest and is tempted to rest her head there, absurdly nervous. She steels herself and nuzzles up against Zayn’s nipple for a distraction, letting it drag against her lips as she slides her fingers down lower. 

Zayn is so wet that it actually surprises Louis into reacting, a muffled sound against Zayn’s chest. Louis’ fingers easily slip against her skin and she immediately feels out Zayn’s clit to circle around it, but Zayn snatches her wrist, holding her hand still. 

“Alright?” Louis asks, straining her eyes to see Zayn’s face. 

She nods quickly for a few seconds without speaking, getting in a few breaths. “Just, like, I like it one way a lot, m’too sensitive to rub right on it?” 

“Show me,” Louis says. She’s too eager to be apologetic, fingers still shaking underneath Zayn’s hand. 

“Just--” Zayn breathes, rubbing down Louis’ knuckles. She turns Louis’ hand to fit under hers properly, spreading both of their index and middle fingers to frame them around her clit. “Just on either side, yeah?” 

Despite having the same body parts, touching Zayn is different than touching herself. She knows where everything is, but Louis’ used to feeling the corresponding touch between her own legs. The familiarity seems like it stems more from her being with _Zayn_ than her knowing what a clit feels like under her fingers. She sits up again to see their overlapping hands, squeezing her two fingers together gently to tease Zayn’s clit, clenching her own thighs tight when Zayn’s hips twitch up. “Yeah?” 

“ _Yeah_ ,” Zayn mumbles, edging off into a soft groan. She rolls her hips up on purpose this time, “Up and down, like,” pulling her hand away to grip Louis’ arm once she complies. 

It’s easy to keep up like this, with Zayn’s gentle rocking thrusts against her fingers; it’s so slick that Louis can see the shine on her fingers and Zayn’s cunt even in the dark. The longer she waits the more she runs over the dialogue in her head, almost letting it go, but eventually Louis mumbles, “You’re absolutely soaked, love.” 

Half expecting a round of banter, Louis’ hit with a punch of arousal when Zayn just huffs out a breath and grinds up hard against her fingers, making a heady noise that sounds like agreement. 

Encouraged, Louis says what she’s been thinking from the start, heart pounding hard in her ears; “I wanna taste you.” 

“Oh my god,” Zayn whines, “Jesus, Lou.” 

“Can I?” Louis squeezes Zayn’s clit between her fingers again, unbearably curious about how the wetness would feel under her tongue. 

“Are you really asking me that right now? Fuck.” Zayn scrubs her face with both hands and looks up at Louis, breathing heavily. “Please.” She finally kicks her knickers off and onto the floor, planting her feet on the mattress. 

“You’ll have to tell me if m’rubbish,” Louis jokes, scooting down to kiss low on Zayn’s belly. She tries keeping her fingers where Zayn put them but ends up cupping her with her full hand instead, the mess between her fingers turning her on even more. 

“Will do,” Zayn breathes. She opens her legs a bit more pointedly and Louis climbs over her to settle between them, allowing herself an obvious once-over of Zayn’s body before bending down to get closer to her. 

The first touch of her tongue is misplaced and overeager in the dark, lower than she meant to lick, but Zayn whines above her and Louis can _feel_ her muscles clench, right against her mouth. The taste is overwhelming, different than what Louis’ tasted of herself from her own fingers; Zayn is almost sweet, strong but manageable enough that Louis licks more firmly instead of drawing back. Knowing now how sensitive Zayn is, Louis’ careful when she drags her tongue up to find her clit, trying to relearn the anatomy by touch. Zayn’s hips jerk when she finds it, and Louis’ unsure of what to do next or how rough it might feel to Zayn, so she brings her lips together in a kiss and stretches her body out until she’s flat on her belly, holding onto Zayn’s thighs. 

“You can, like,” Zayn starts - she pauses for a stretch of seconds so long that Louis gets anxious, kissing her clit again just to move her mouth - “Yeah, suck, you can suck.” 

Parting her lips to get Zayn’s clit between them pushes her chin right up against Zayn’s cunt, especially when Zayn rolls her hips to meet Louis’ mouth. Her first instinct is to pull away, but she remembers suddenly each time Harvey tried for her and the mess he ended up with the time he made her come like that, wet from nose to chin. She resists moving, sucking as gently at Zayn’s clit as she can manage, and gradually gives her harder pulls when it seems like she wants it, arching her hips up against Louis’ lips. 

“Oh _fuck_ , like that,” Zayn whispers eventually, nearly hissing when Louis hums against her. It’s only different from sucking cock in the best ways; Louis’ not worried about choking when Zayn pushes closer to her mouth, or whether she’ll have to find a place to spit once Zayn’s finished, or where to put her teeth. She looks up Zayn’s body and nearly shivers when she finds Zayn already watching her, both hands fisting the sheets around her. 

“ _Jesus_ ,” Louis mumbles, suddenly overwhelmed by how far they’ve gone so quickly. She indulges herself and licks down where Zayn’s wettest again, a bit greedy for the taste she can only get a hint of at Zayn’s clit. 

“No, no, no, go back, Lou, please, m’close,” Zayn whimpers, even as she’s opening her thighs wider for it, reaching down to cup the back of Louis’ head and guide her back up toward her clit. A sheet of Louis’ hair falls into her face but Zayn pushes it away and holds the bulk of it together with one fist at the crown of Louis’ head, tugging her closer when Louis sucks her clit harder than before. Louis groans as quietly as she can manage against Zayn, trapped between her cunt and her hand.

Zayn comes quietly, though Louis suspects it’s just because of the other people in the house who aren’t meant to hear; she holds her breath and whines from the back of her throat when her orgasm’s halfway through, grinding shamelessly against Louis’ mouth while Louis tries to stay attached to her clit. She sucks until Zayn starts twitching with every pulse and stays even then, dipping her tongue down into Zayn’s cunt instead, as gently as she can. It’s almost over faster than she wanted it to be, and Louis thinks she could stay here long enough for Zayn to calm down and go again, if Zayn wanted to. Her jaw hardly aches and it feels good to slip her tongue against Zayn’s slick skin, better than she thought it would feel. 

“Oh my god,” Zayn says, “you been lyin’ to me?” 

“No?” Louis softly licks Zayn’s clit, just to see, and grins when Zayn’s thighs jerk under her hands. “About what?” 

“ _That_ ,” Zayn breathes, petting absently at Louis’ hair now. 

“What about _that_ ,” Louis asks, a bit teasing; she kisses the crease of Zayn’s thigh and rests her head there, pleased with how intimate the position feels now that she’s not quite as distracted. 

“About _that_ being your first time doing it. I know it was, but like-- _was_ it? Christ,” Zayn murmurs. She pulls the longest strands of Louis’ hair over her hip and works her fingers through to the roots while Louis finally wipes her face dry with the back of her hand, not worried about the mess now. 

“Just did what you told me to,” Louis murmurs back. She rubs Zayn’s belly and tilts her head to look up at her, smiling this time when Zayn’s already looking back. 

“You look good down there,” Zayn teases. 

“Think I might like it down here,” Louis admits. She lifts her fingers in invitation when Zayn’s brush against them, sighing when they link together. 

“You better get up here b’fore you get any ideas, then,” Zayn says. She gently tugs Louis’ fingers until her arm is stretched out straight and then lets their hands settle on her chest, waiting for Louis to move. 

Louis can feel her own pulse between her legs, her clit throbbing with how turned on she is, but she still feels reluctant to move, comfortable like this. The iPod has cycled through enough songs that she can’t remember them all and has landed on a slow beat now, so lazy that Louis thinks she could take a nap before coming herself.

“C’mon,” Zayn urges, “your turn now.” She untangles her fingers from Louis’ and slides her hand along her forearm instead, lifting herself up onto one hand invitingly. 

“Only if I can kiss you once I get up there,” Louis says, starting to crawl up slowly anyway. She places her knees and elbows carefully, shaking her hair out of her face and pushing it over one shoulder to get it out of the way. 

“You can kiss me any time you like,” Zayn says back, soft and serious. 

“What a sap,” Louis says, teasing even as her cheeks pink up in the dark. Zayn leans forward until she’s fully sitting up and Louis settles on her lap like she’s done countless times before, feet tucked underneath the hollows of Zayn’s knees. She curls a hand around Zayn’s neck underneath the blanket of her hair and ducks down, gently touching the tip of her nose to Zayn’s before kissing her. 

The kiss is really anything but sappy. Zayn’s hands go straight to Louis’ waist and begin sliding down until her thumbs can sneak underneath the band of Louis’ knickers, stroking along the crease of her thighs. She opens for it when she feels Zayn lick along her lip, and rolls her hips greedily toward Zayn when her own tongue touches the metal barbell Zayn wears in her piercing. Zayn grins, drawing her tongue back to kiss Louis’ chin and the front of her throat. Her fingertips tease Louis’ knickers down lower until they slip down over her bum on their own and she’s seated in Zayn’s lap, nearly naked, fingers trembling at the back of Zayn’s neck while Zayn’s kissing sweetly along her clavicle. 

“I’m shaking like a virgin, to be honest,” Louis says, huffing out a breath to calm herself down. She curls her toes together under Zayn’s knees and Zayn twitches like it tickles, giggling into Louis’ neck. 

“As good as a virgin, aren’t ya?” Zayn drags her nails down the outsides of Louis’ thighs and Louis shivers, thankful they’re worn down and dull, gentle against her skin. 

“I resent that,” Louis says. She obediently lifts up onto her knees and lets Zayn pull her knickers down lower, lifting one leg and then the other as Zayn works them off her body entirely. Zayn kisses her belly before Louis settles back into her lap, more self conscious now; she squeezes her thighs together a bit tighter, not quite as close to Zayn as she was before. 

“C’mon,” Zayn mumbles; she slips her arms around Louis’ waist and tries to coax her closer, leaning up to kiss her lips again. Louis kisses back enthusiastically, glad for the distraction, but Zayn keeps talking into it, “Just had your mouth on my pussy, think we both know where this is going.” 

“ _Christ_ , you’ve got a dirty mouth in bed,” Louis says, practically at a whisper, as if someone else could hear over the music. She cants her hips closer, effectively putting herself on display, and sucks both her lips between her teeth to bite down on as Zayn feels up her thighs, pulling them open just a bit more.

Zayn noses down between her breasts and kisses there, fingertips trailing lightly down the lines of Louis’ hips. It’d tickle if she weren’t so aroused. “Can I touch you?” 

Louis just nods, fingers working uselessly at Zayn’s back until they find enough hair to hold onto; she moans properly when Zayn strokes just one finger between her legs. Her hand returns a second later, all her fingers cupping Louis’ cunt, the heel of her hand fitted perfectly up against her clit. Louis curses and grinds forward into it, willing herself to stay quiet; it’s a _chore_ with Zayn finally touching her, her mouth veering to the side to suck in a nipple. Unlike the first time, Zayn licks with the wide flat of her tongue, letting her jewelry catch on Louis’ nipple. Louis can feel her clit pulse at that, like her body parts are jealous of one another, and she holds the back of Zayn’s head like she did before to keep her mouth there. 

She doesn’t move, talking against Louis’ breast instead, “You like something in you?” 

“God, please,” she answers, muscles going tense at the tease of Zayn’s middle finger rubbing at the entrance to her body. When she pushes inside, Louis has to press her mouth to the top of Zayn’s head, whimpering into her hair. 

“Two or three?” Zayn asks. She moves just the single finger slowly inside and Louis pants against her, trying to let the sleepy scent of Zayn’s day-old hairspray and perfume calm her down. 

“Three,” she whispers, clearing her throat when it comes out raspy. “Three, please, three.” It’ll be tight and she knows it, but that’s what she likes: the stretch that makes her body feel like it’s working for it, letting her know she’ll still feel it after she’s come and relaxed. 

She doesn’t have to wait long for the stretch; Zayn skips the single second finger and slowly eases two more into her at the same time, suckling at her nipple all the while. Louis curls in on herself further, hips jerking forward and head slumping down, gasping when Zayn has to pull off her chest to let Louis lean on her body. 

“Y’alright? You’re tight,” Zayn murmurs, kissing Louis’ jaw. It’s the same line Harvey’s used a thousand times, exciting the first times they were together but slowly devolving into a throwaway porno clip to fill the silence, _you’re so tight babe_ , but coming from Zayn it sounds like gentle concern, so disarmingly caring that Louis has to kiss her too, mouthing at her neck. 

“Yeah,” she says, “I like it.” Zayn exhales against her cheek and slips her fingers out just to the second knuckle - when she pushes them back in, the sound is so slick and loud that Louis whines, partially in embarrassment, clenching down tight. 

“And you said _I_ was soaked,” Zayn says, nuzzling under Louis’ ear. She kisses the lobe and moves her fingers in and out a few more times, fucking Louis slowly while she pants against Zayn’s neck, mouth open; Zayn whispers when she continues, “So wet I can feel it down my fuckin’ wrist already, babe.”

Louis burrows more completely into Zayn’s neck, latching on in a gentle bite to keep from moaning when her body bears down on Zayn’s fingers. Zayn drags the tip of her nose and the gentlest brush of her lips down the slope of Louis’ shoulder, making her shiver in spite of the sweat she can feel starting at the back of her neck. The straight slide of Zayn’s fingers is more than enough on its own, but it’s not until she begins curving them inside Louis’ body that Louis can hardly force herself to stay quiet, teeth sinking deeper into Zayn’s skin. 

“Wanted this,” Zayn whispers, simply. 

Louis’ breath catches. She can’t make herself focus on the words yet, the abstract “before” and “after” right now, not when she’s so single-mindedly working towards release. She tilts her hips forward, searching for solid pressure to grind her clit against and whispers back, “Not fair to go soppy on me yet, m’a bit busy.” 

Zayn kisses the ball of her shoulder and the dip of her neck instead of replying and Louis shivers again, lifting her head to try and find Zayn’s mouth. They both straighten up to reach each other’s lips, and Louis has to whimper when Zayn’s fingers slide deeper and stay buried inside her, moving only to curl and press against a spot that hardly ever gets attention. The heel of her hand rests just over Louis’ clit again, and she rolls her hips gratefully into the feeling. 

“I love you,” Louis breathes. Zayn’s fingers become momentarily rough inside her and Louis gasps, jerking into the sharpness of the pleasure; she moves one of her own hands down to cup Zayn’s and pushes it harder against her body. 

“Love you, too,” Zayn replies. She keeps her fingers moving, almost harshly, and Louis has to moan through the feeling, cut off in the last milliseconds by Zayn’s mouth on hers. The wetness that’s covered Zayn’s entire hand is embarrassing, knowing the mess that’ll be all over them by the end, and Louis kisses hungrily to avoid thinking that far ahead. Her fingers slip against Zayn’s knuckles and she digs her nails in to keep her grip. 

“Faster,” she mumbles, helplessly working her hips against their hands. Zayn complies the second she asks, nearly doubling her pace, and Louis whines against her chin. 

“Close?” Zayn asks, and Louis nods, her breaths coming out more like shudders. It can’t be comfortable for Zayn, her wrist twisted between Louis’ body and hand, but when she considers it, Louis only thinks of how it felt to be held in place against Zayn’s cunt. She feels the beginning of her orgasm before it really hits, her muscles clenching down tightly and rhythmically without her permission first, and then a sudden shock of arousal and relief; it’s so deep in her gut that it feels like a physical blow, making her curl in on herself and press her face right back into the same spot on Zayn’s neck. 

“ _Stop,_ stop,” Louis gasps, her body shaking with the stimulation when Zayn’s fingers curl again. She keeps her hand pressed tightly over Zayn’s, though, to stop her from pulling away yet, too greedy for the extra tendrils of pleasure she can work out of herself before she gets too sensitive. 

Louis takes her time panting against Zayn’s neck until she can get her breath back, slowly loosening her grip on Zayn’s hand. Louis’ exhale comes out as a soft hum as Zayn works her fingers out and strokes between her legs, the touch tingling and pleasant. 

Zayn kisses Louis’ cheek and temple, mumbling there, “Next time m’gonna bring an umbrella.” 

“Oh god,” Louis laughs, circling her fingers around Zayn’s wrist. She lifts her head and looks between them at their hands. “Was it that bad, really?” 

“It’s a _lot_ ,” Zayn says; she brings her hand up closer, and Louis can only see a bit of shine in the dark, but she can smell herself between them and her face heats, her cunt still throbbing faintly. “I’ll have to put my hair up to eat you out, else we’ll make a proper mess.” 

“Shut up,” Louis replies, too flustered for a witty response. She climbs out of Zayn’s lap while she’s busy cleaning her hand on her discarded top and crawls under the blanket, trying to tug it out from under Zayn’s body. “Get in here.” Zayn snuggles up close and Louis crowds in even closer, not content until their chests are pressed together and her nose nudges Zayn’s.

“Hi,” Zayn says. Louis kisses her lips, sliding a hand down Zayn’s torso to rest affectionately on the curve of her bum. Zayn’s returning kisses are surprisingly chaste, a sweet set of pecks that ends with both of them smiling into each other’s mouths. 

“If this is how things are going to be from now on, I’m not sure I can deal with it. Absolutely disgusting,” Louis jokes. 

“I can be rude to you f’you like,” Zayn says. “You complete… wanker.” 

“There was actually no wanking to be had tonight,” Louis points out.

“Do you feel like a new woman?” 

In lieu of replying, Louis starts humming “Like A Virgin.” She only makes it halfway through the chorus before she’s left to mumble the lyrics she knows into Zayn’s laughing mouth.

 

\--

 

Louis wakes with her forearm stuck to Zayn’s bare waist underneath the blankets, sweaty and exhausted. It’s dark out still but Zayn’s awake, scrolling slowly through her Twitter page with one hand while she strokes her fingertips over the back of Louis’ arm with the other. 

Louis mumbles, “We should get a place without sisters.” 

Zayn doesn’t falter in her scrolling. “How am I meant to pay rent? Sell my body?” 

“Could do porn together. Internet porn, webcams and that. People would _pay_.” 

“We’re quite fit together,” Zayn admits. “Let’s look into it.” 

“Think we need the place without sisters to do the internet porn,” Louis says, yawning. She scoots in closer until she can lift her head up to rest it on Zayn’s chest. Her mouth settles temptingly close to Zayn’s nipple, so she kisses it gently, letting her arm remain glued to Zayn’s torso. 

Humming, Zayn turns off her phone and tosses it to the end of the bed, smoothing down the knots that’ve formed in Louis’ hair before kissing her temple. “We’ll figure something out.”


End file.
